Orwell’s fourth novel,

was published in 1939 under the lengthening shadows of pan-European Fascism. Both pathos and paradox are evident in the book. Pathos because it was largely written abroad where Orwell was in medical exile due to the difficulties he was experiencing in trying to draw air into his own frail lungs. Paradoxical because, of all Orwell’s novels,

most vividly rekindles the fading aura of dappled Edwardian Englishness despite the fact that it was written in Morocco.

The story features George Bowling, originally of shopkeeper stock, but now a wage-slave in the brash world of insurance-selling while tyrannised by Hilda, his joyless, suspicious wife and their two “kiddies” in the bourgeois purgatory that haunts the euphemism

1817 words

Citation: Williams, Nigel. "Coming up for Air". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 27 March 2012 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=5879, accessed 21 November 2024.]