Someone who understood him: a friend, that was what it came down to.” Who would help him to live with nothing hidden, nothing unexpressed.

Someone who would love Burma as he loved it and hate it as he hated it. To find someone who would share his life in Burma – but really share it, share his inner, secret life, carry away from Burma the same memories as he carried. “… There was, he saw clearly, only one way out. His loneliness makes him suffer terribly. Also the fact that he has made friends with Indian Dr Veraswami discredits him in the eyes of his compatriots, but even with him he is never fully at ease. Moreover, he doesn’t share their narrow views, notably not their complete deprecation of and disrespect for the natives and their ancient culture. Fate has stricken him with an ugly dark-blue birthmark on his left cheek that makes him feel despicable. There are a handful of Europeans living in Kyauktada whom he uses to meet at the European Club although he feels an outsider and unable to speak his mind in their presence. As a timber merchant he passes most of his time in a jungle camp north of Mandalay, but every month he returns to his house in the small town of Kyauktada at the Irrawaddy river in Upper Burma for a couple of days. The Englishman John Flory is in his mid-thirties and has known the monotony of Burmese Days for nearly fifteen years. George Orwell died in London, U.K., in January 1950. Only his last two novels brought the author worldwide and lasting fame: Animal Farm (1945) and Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949). Along with the account of his experiences in Spain titled Homage to Catalonia (1938) he wrote the novel Coming Up for Air (1939), before he started working with the Home Guard, the BBC and the Tribune during World War II. Then he joined the Republican Forces in Spain and fought in the Civil War until he was seriously wounded. His first novel to appear was Burmese Days in 1934 that was followed by The Clergyman’s Daughter in 1935 and Keep the Aspidistra Flying in 1936. While he did all kinds of odd jobs to make a living in London and Paris, he wrote important journalistic works like Down and Out in London and Paris (1933) and The Road to Wigan Pier (1937). In 1922, he joined the Imperial Police in Burma (today: Myanmar), but resigned after five years to dedicate himself to writing. His family returned to England in 1907 where he went to school and wrote regularly for different college magazines. George Orwell was the pen name of Eric Arthur Blair who was born in Motihari, India, in January 1903.

Burmese days