It's interesting, thinking about this and other debates going on, to reflect
that Wodehouse, along with 'Lord Haw-haw', and I think Ezra Pound, were
vilified for making radio broadcasts -- what they said, rather than what
they wrote.
:P
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Poetryetc provides a venue for a dialogue relating to
> poetry and poetics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
> Behalf Of Rebecca Seiferle
> Sent: 24 January 2005 00:08
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: orwell
>
> I think your assessment of Orwell here, Alison, is very fair
> and even-handed, and draws equal attention to his strengths
> as a writer and his particular blind spots. On the other
> hand, I think it's in the Wodehouse essay, Orwell criticizes
> the witch hunting at that time in England for "Quislings and
> traitors" and finding Wodehouse somewhat unfairly seized
> upon, and it's a bit difficult for me to square that with the
> equivalent of volunteering to deliver up names for the then
> equivalent of un-American activities committee. Perhaps it
> just depends on who's being hunted. And it may well be
> consistent of his views of traitors, for I don't know all of
> Orwell's work that well, just some, but in the Wodehouse
> essay, Orwell's argument seems to be larger, not just that
> Wodehouse wasn't a traitor but sort of a naive dupe, but that
> scapegoating is a way of hiding various other duplicities,
> etc. Well and perhaps I can't get past my sense of the
> present, how easy and progressively easier, it would be to do
> this. I am curious how one gets to this point of moral
> certainty that one would offer to turn over names to the
> government and perhaps it's just that seems to me beyond the pale.
>
> best,
>
> Rebecca
> ---- Original message ----
> >Date: Mon, 24 Jan 2005 09:17:11 +1100
> >From: Alison Croggon <[log in to unmask]>
> >Subject: Re: orwell
> >To: [log in to unmask]
> >
> >On 24/1/05 8:43 AM, "Rebecca Seiferle" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> >> But Orwell is somewhat
> >> troubling too, or at any rate has been to me since I read these
> >> particular accounts, one from an old issue of the Guardian and
> >> another from European Digest.
> >
> >I admire Orwell, mainly because I think he's a painfully honest and
> >often extremely brave writer, always thoughtful and often prescient
> >(he's very interesting to read right now). That doesn't mean that I
> >don't read some of his essays with my eyebrows raised. He
> has a huge
> >blind spot about gender, for example. His thoughts on
> patriotism, and
> >his attempts to disentangle patriotism from nationalism (he
> claims they
> >are different things) are also rather muddy; he never wholly escaped
> >his English public school/civil service indoctrination, and
> sometimes
> >the traditional British officer jumps into his thinking with
> startling
> >clarity. He also hated English communists and thought their
> allegiance
> >to Russia little short of treacherous. His offer to provide a
> >blacklist is, I'm afraid, totally consistent with those
> thoughts in his essays, and so doesn't surprise me.
> >
> >Best
> >
> >A
> >
> >
> >Alison Croggon
> >
> >Blog: http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
> >Editor, Masthead: http://masthead.net.au Home page:
> >http://alisoncroggon.com
>
>
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