THIS IS THE HOME SITE OF THE BLAIR/ORWELL ESSAY

Published bi-monthly

In January 2008 we decided that it was the right time to launch a www.Forum for responsible, informed discussion and debate about George Orwell’s life and work. We are therefore publishing, on a bi-monthly basis, essays within our Homepage, written by distinguished students of Orwell, whether academics, biographers or independent researchers. A debating Forum, protected for privacy, has also been established.

George Orwell’s contemporaries are long gone. The scholars who first recorded the recollections of those contemporaries are no longer young. We feel that it is particularly urgent to collect and evaluate the testimony of those who possess credible, even if ‘second-hand’, information about Orwell’s life which has not yet been adequately disclosed. Otherwise this information will be forever lost to those who come after us.

The April/May Essay

Orwell: Religion and Ethical Values

by Peter Davison OBE, PhD, D.Litt, Hon. D. Arts

PROFESSOR Peter Davison, having spent nearly 25 years compiling The Complete Works of George Orwell in 20 volumes, has also written another six books with Orwell as subject. He must be regarded, therefore, as one of the prime sources of knowledge concerning this great socio-political literary genius of the 20th century.

Professor Davison, having been appointed a Fellowship at the Shakespeare Institute, worked at the University of Birmingham and lectured at universities worldwide, including Australia and the United States. In 1991 he joined the newly-created De Montfort University in Leicester as a Research Professor. He was awarded the OBE in 1999 and also in the same year D.Litt. and Hons.D. Arts degrees. In 2003 he was awarded the Gold Medal of the Bibliographical Society. His latest book The Lost Orwell was published in 2006. See link The Orwell Essay.

Please respond, comment or challenge through the Forum link.

* The January/February Essay by Professor Sir Bernard Crick, entitled Orwell as Comic Writer can now be found in the Orwell Essay Archive where it may continue to be read, enjoyed and commented upon.

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