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7th out of 155 books
—
82 voters
Finding George Orwell in Burma
by
Emma Larkin
A fascinating political travelogue that traces the life and work of George Orwell in Southeast Asia
Over the years the American writer Emma Larkin has spent traveling in Burma, also known as Myanmar, she's come to know all too well the many ways this brutal police state can be described as "Orwellian." The life of the mind exists in a state of siege in Burma, and it long h...more
Over the years the American writer Emma Larkin has spent traveling in Burma, also known as Myanmar, she's come to know all too well the many ways this brutal police state can be described as "Orwellian." The life of the mind exists in a state of siege in Burma, and it long h...more
Paperback, 304 pages
Published
March 6th 2006
by Penguin Books
(first published 2004)
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Emma Larkin - a pseudonym for an American journalist living in Bangkok who hypothesizes that George Orwell's Animal Farm and 1984 were set in Burma (and not the Soviet Union). After all Burmese Days his first book, and his last novella (untitled) which he wrote upon his death bed, were both set in Burma. He lived there for 5 years as an Imperial policeman and of course, also wrote the beautiful short story Shooting an Eleplant. I'm a big Orwell fan. I was so excited to read this book and she doe...more
A mix of a book: history, politics, travelogue, analysis and biography all rolled up into one. Emma Larkin manages to bring all these things together in an interesting way.
Tracing George Orwell’s career path in Burma while she is on a trip to Burma, Larkin contrasts her observations, the country’s political situation and the state of the people in present time with Orwell’s experiences as a young, impressionable colonial police officer in his various posts throughout Burma, his observations and...more
Tracing George Orwell’s career path in Burma while she is on a trip to Burma, Larkin contrasts her observations, the country’s political situation and the state of the people in present time with Orwell’s experiences as a young, impressionable colonial police officer in his various posts throughout Burma, his observations and...more
5 likes · like · see review
Finding George Orwell in Burma
takes a unique approach to both travel and foreign reporting. First, the travels through the country follow George Orwell's stations when he was an imperial police officer in the country (experiences that led to his first novel,
Burmese Days
). But Orwell serves as a focus in another way. The author tries to take us inside the rampant government paranoia and repressiveness, comparing the country's current state directly to Orwell's
1984
. I read the book roughly a...more
This was a book club pick and proved to be an interesting challenge because my prior knowledge of Burma was around zero, and I didn’t remember much from school about George Orwell.
Emma Larkin is a pseudonym for a writer who has lived in Thailand and has crossed the border into Burma (now Myanmar) several times to write about the country and its human rights issues. In this book, she traces the time George Orwell spent in Burma as a member of the British Imperial Police. His experiences there in...more
Emma Larkin is a pseudonym for a writer who has lived in Thailand and has crossed the border into Burma (now Myanmar) several times to write about the country and its human rights issues. In this book, she traces the time George Orwell spent in Burma as a member of the British Imperial Police. His experiences there in...more
2 likes · like · see review
I have visited Myanmar (formerly known as Burma). I had some misgivings about visiting the military totalitarian state at first. It is sort of a mini version of North Korea, but with less power. But this book helped changed my mind since I am equally interested in George Orwell, one of my favorite writers, and I particularly enjoyed his colonial novel Burmese Days. Thus, I was naturally inclined to read Emma Larkin’s book Secret Histories: Finding George Orwell In A Burmese Tea Shop. It didn’t d...more
If you have an interest in either Burma (now Myanmar) or George Orwell, you would find this to be a quick read. Emma Larkin's central argument is that Burma has become a living example of the totalitarian rule depicted in Orwell's 1984: the torture of political dissents; the omnipotent rule of the "Big Brother"-like junta; the highly effective intelligence network based on informants; the ability of the government to cower and destroy the individual. Orwell spent time as a colonial police office...more
Larkin has written an absorbing travelogue of her year in Burma visiting the towns where Orwell lived during his time in the colonial British police. She makes a compelling argument for reading three Orwell novels as a trilogy about Burma: Burmese Days about the colonial period, Animal Farm about the period when the junta first took control, and Nineteen Eighty-Four, which can be read as Orwell’s foretelling of the present state of affairs in Burma. I’m glad I read the book AFTER my trip to Burm...more
When I first started researching Burma, I tried to start with Burma: The Curse of Independence (see my bookshelf for another review) but couldn't get into it at first because it was so mind-boggling to keep track of the many peoples, languages, and organization acronyms that co-exist with Burma's borders. I needed a toe-hold on the country first. Larkin's book gave me the overview on the history and the current situation in Burma which allowed me to make sense of Burma: The Curse of Independence...more
From 1922 to 1927, young George Orwell (aka Eric Blair) lived in Burma, where he was employed by the Indian Imperial Police. He spent those years at the police training school in Mandalay and then policing remote villages in the Burmese interior and administering the police bureaucracy in a few of the larger coastal cities. Finding George Orwell is a travelogue structured around the premise that Orwell’s experience of British colonial rule in Burma inspired him to write about social injustice an...more
I first read this book just over 5 years ago – I had to check back to be sure of when it was. I loved it – but rather rashly gave away my copy thinking I could get another copy easily. Well it proved rather harder to get a cheap copy (I balked at the some of the high prices on the internet). So when Kaggsy from Librarything recently offered me a second hand copy she had found I was delighted. It even arrived in time to fit into my month of re-reading.
Many years ago I read George Orwell’s Animal...more
Many years ago I read George Orwell’s Animal...more
This was a Christmas present Drew gave to me two years ago...and I finally got a chance to pick it up. I'm glad! I really have a creepy fascination about George Orwell (I especially love 1984 and Animal Farm), so the premise of this book was great for me. While writing as essentially a travel journal, the author connects Orwell's time in Burma in the 1920s as a colonial policeman for the British government to his writing about totalitarian rule. I didn't realize it but Burma (even today) has one...more
There are two things George Orwell and Burma (now Myanmar) have in common. First, Orwell actually spent five years stationed in Burma before his writing career. Second, the present military regime bears a striking resemblance to the societies Orwell describes in his works, "Animal Farm" and "Nineteen Eighty Four". The tyrannical and closed country of Myanmar is exposed through this travelogue that is interestingly and topically adorned with underground interviews and beautifully described scenes...more
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In Burma, the intellectuals refer to Orwell as "the prophet."
It turns out that Orwell (nee Eric Blair) served for five years in the Indian Imperial Police in the 1920s, where he learned to hate imperialism. His book Burmese Days reflects his experiences there and of course Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm foretold a time of Big Brother, the Thought Police, and double-think.
Larkin (nom de plum for an American journalist born and raised in Asia) follows Orwell's tracks from his Burmese days a...more
It turns out that Orwell (nee Eric Blair) served for five years in the Indian Imperial Police in the 1920s, where he learned to hate imperialism. His book Burmese Days reflects his experiences there and of course Nineteen Eighty-Four and Animal Farm foretold a time of Big Brother, the Thought Police, and double-think.
Larkin (nom de plum for an American journalist born and raised in Asia) follows Orwell's tracks from his Burmese days a...more
I read this for my book group, and I have to admit I wasn't looking forward to it. But this book was fascinating. I didn't know anything about Burma's cultural or political history. And I didn't know about George Orwell's ties to that country.
The edition I read was from 2004, so the political events are frozen in that time (particularly the afterword).
The book has a lot of atmosphere. I could see the banyan trees and feel the humidity and smell the general decay that permeates tropical countri...more
The edition I read was from 2004, so the political events are frozen in that time (particularly the afterword).
The book has a lot of atmosphere. I could see the banyan trees and feel the humidity and smell the general decay that permeates tropical countri...more
I had expected to find a sad story of a brutal dictatorship and a ruined country when I picked up this book. I did find that, but I also found so much more. According to Larkin, a pseudonym for one of few journalists who have been allowed in the country, Burma is a country where “Everywhere you look, someone is reading.” Some of the greatest authors in Western Literature are treasured here. Mildewed and ant-chewed copies of books are displayed proudly, or hidden carefully away so as to avoid the...more
An interesting book about Burma and George Orwell. Orwell, of course, is famous for two novels that could easily describe life in totalitarian Burma: 1984 and Animal Farm. He also wrote a memoir titled Burmese Days, and in fact served with the British colonial police in that country during the 1920s, and Emma Larkin makes the case that Orwell's Burmese experience influenced much of his later writing. The bulk of Larkin's story is about Burma itself, the Burma of today, whose citizens live under...more
I was drawn to this book because I fell in love with George Orwell after reading an essay titled "Shooting an Elephant." The essay describes an incident that took place during his time as a British police officer in Burma in the 1920s. "Shooting an Elephant" led me to other essays by Orwell. I found that I much prefer them to his fiction. They are passionately felt and finely crafted. In 2003, the author of this book traveled from place to place in Myanmar (Burma's new name), following the route...more
This book is so good. It was always engaging, and I never wanted it to end. The author tracks George Orwell's life as it was when he was working in Burma, in the 1920's or so. There is a map in the front, so you can track both her and Orwell. I learned an incredible amount about Orwell that I could have never imagined before, and it gives wonderful insight onto his life and his other books besides 1984 and Animal Farm. Now I am eager to read his essays and other works. I was also amazed at the i...more
Emma Larkin retraces the footsteps of George Orwell during his long stint with the British Imperial Police during the waning years of British colonialism in Burma, which was formerly part of the British Raj. Most of Orwell's writings are banned in the country, and he is seen as a prophetic figure among both the Burmese intelligentsia, as well as common folk. Burma is a modern police state, despite a slowly changing political landscape in which the once closed-off society is slowly being opened u...more
In this book, the author tells about the historical and political situation of Burma through the lens of George Orwell and his novels. It's an interesting premise, since Orwell spent a lot of time in Burma, but it just didn't really pan out. At the beginning I was really into the book, I even went to the library and checked out a few of Orwell's novels, planning to read them concurrently with this book. I quickly learned that I'm not all that interested in Orwell. I just got bored when reading p...more
I wasn't prepared to like this book. I teach Animal Farm, and occasionally teach 1984. I don't always teach Animal Farm with precisely the historical allegory that I was taught, because I think my students can understand bullies, violence, passive aggressiveness, and when rule making goes horribly awry, even if they don't always understand it in a historical context. Reading Finding George Orwell in Burma validated how I teach Animal Farm, because it is so much more than just one allegory.
In Bur...more
In Bur...more
Orwell is one of my favorite authors, but I just could not enjoy this book. As a magazine article or short travelogue, it would have been interesting. Instead, it was an interminable journey through Burma where everything seemed the same. The author was tracked by military intelligence, could have few meaningful conversations, and hardly stumbled onto anything interesting about George Orwell.
Burma is, no doubt, a sad and depressing place in a terrible situation. But to base an entire book on th...more
Burma is, no doubt, a sad and depressing place in a terrible situation. But to base an entire book on th...more
Early in the book the author says, "In Burma there is a joke that Orwell wrote not just one novel about the country, but three: a trilogy comprised of "Burmese Days," "Animal Farm," and "Nineteen Eighty-Four." After reading this book I have to agree with her. But, unlike Orwell's novels, Larkin's book left me with the faint hope that someday, somehow, things might change. I am very cynical about the current changes in Burma - temporary window dressing to receive certain concessions from outside...more
I thought this was a very interesting book. I didn't really realize how oppressed the people of Burma are under their current Government. It was an eye-opener! I also enjoyed how the author related the Government of Burma to the works of George Orwell. The Burmese say that Orwell wrote not one novel about the country, but three: Burmese Days, Animal Farm and 1984. The first takes place during the British colonial days, while the latter two more closely reflect the situation there today. I have r...more
Before Eric Blair was George Orwell, before he wrote 1984 or Animal Farm he was stationed in Burma (now Myanmar) with the Imperial Police Force. Finding George Orwell in Burma is Emma Larkin's account of a visit to Myanmar where she attempts to follow the path of George Orwell and his writings in a country where Orwellian is not just a literary term but an apt description, where Orwell's works are banned and one can be arrested and imprisoned merely for saying the wrong thing in the wrong place....more
I read Burmese Days by George Orwell when I first came to Thailand 36 years ago and thought it summed up expatriate life in South-East Asia. Until recently Burma was inaccessible and enigmatic, therefore fascinating to me, living so close and yet so far away on the other side of the closed border. Emma Larkin's book is about George Orwell the writer and about her own journey into Burma (now Myanmar) a century later. Her book was obviously written by a person that had developed a great fondness f...more
A remarkable insight into a land that remains under a thick shroud to most in the West. In this genre-bending work, Emma Larkin follows the path of a young George Orwell during his time as a colonial police officer in Burma. Gracefully combining a biography of Orwell and a commentary on the political climate of Burma with the engaging stories of her travels, Larkin successfully conveys the sense of hopeless struggle against totalitarianism that is as present in modern Burma as it was in the Orwe...more
The author, Emma Larkin (pseudonym,) has written an unusual travelogue of modern Myanmar. I picked it up, not because I’m a fan of George Orwell, but because I’m curious about a country – locked, for decades, by a military junta behind closed doors - that renames itself. I can’t pick out Burma on a map with accuracy, but I can quote Kipling’s romantic verse about its famous cities. Remove its familiar name cues and you can also change its story to the world! (a point brought out in the book.) Th...more
This isn't just another travelogue. It's about Burma, but also about George Orwell's Burma. There's great insights into the culture and also gives you a hint of the national psyche under the military junta. Orwell's novels and essays weave in and out of the narrative. His pessimistic, cynical opinions on colonialism and socialism gone wrong are paralleled with the current climate in a country that has seen so much oppression. She has a really beautiful writing style that really makes the scenes...more
I liked this book. It's been on my shelf for a while, and I thought it was about time I read it. I bought it for two reasons: (1) I liked the cover and (2) Joseph had just gone on an Orwell frenzy—he bought like every book Orwell wrote—so I thought this would be an interesting addition to the collection. I was right. It was really interesting insight into Orwell's life and writing and the situation in Burma. In the middle of reading the book I wondered what other people did after they finish. I...more
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updated Nov 09, 2007 05:08pm