How did George Orwell die?
22092085#10
In summer 1946, Orwell decamped to Jura, an island to the west of Scotland. A boating accident did little for his health. In December 1947 he was in hospital in Glasgow. Tuberculosis was diagnosed and the request for permission to import streptomycin to treat Orwell went as far as Aneurin Bevan. After treatment, Orwell was able to return to Jura by the end of July 1948.
How the Poor Die
22092085#12
In January 1949, in a very weak condition, Orwell was taken to a sanatorium in Gloucestershire, consisting of a series of small wooden chalets or huts near Stroud. Visitors were shocked by Orwell's appearance and concerned by the short-comings and ineffectiveness of the treatment. Late in the summer, Orwell was removed to University College Hospital in London. In October he married Sonia Brownell and she prepared plans to take him to the Swiss Alps. Orwell was getting weaker by the beginning of 1950. Sonia spent most of Friday 20 January with Orwell in his private ward but left in the early evening to have dinner with Lucian Freud and another friend. A visitor came and left a parcel outside the room where Orwell was lying alone. Sometime early on Saturday morning an artery burst in his lungs, and a few moments later he was dead, aged 46. Controversy surrounds Sonia's activities. Some say she was at a nightclub and inaccessible. Others claim that at the end of the evening having had dinner with her friends she called the hospital and came back distraught with the news of Orwell's death.
How the Poor Die
22092085#1
In 1928 Orwell went to Paris for 18 months. In March 1929 he was feeling unwell and spent two weeks in the Hôpital Cochin, rue Faubourg Saint-Jacques, in the 15th arrondissement of Paris. Ill with the flu, he was treated at the hospital from 7 to 22 March 1929. While in the hospital he continued writing, as he gave it as an address to a publisher. Orwell was subject to bronchial conditions throughout his life, but it is not certain whether he was suffering from influenza or pneumonia. In Paris, he was checked for tuberculosis and found to be unaffected.
How the Poor Die
11891#60
Orwell's health had continued to decline since the diagnosis of tuberculosis in December 1947. In mid-1949, he courted Sonia Brownell, and they announced their engagement in September, shortly before he was removed to University College Hospital in London. Sonia took charge of Orwell's affairs and attended him diligently in the hospital, causing concern to some old friends such as Muggeridge. In September 1949, Orwell invited his accountant Harrison to visit him in hospital, and Harrison claimed that Orwell then asked him to become director of GOP Ltd and to manage the company, but there was no independent witness. Orwell's wedding took place in the hospital room on 13 October 1949, with David Astor as best man. Orwell was in decline and visited by an assortment of visitors including Muggeridge, Connolly, Lucian Freud, Stephen Spender, Evelyn Waugh, Paul Potts, Anthony Powell, and his Eton tutor Anthony Gow. Plans to go to the Swiss Alps were mooted. Further meetings were held with his accountant, at which Harrison and Mr and Mrs Blair were confirmed as directors of the company, and at which Harrison claimed that the "service agreement" was executed, giving copyright to the company. Orwell's health was in decline again by Christmas. On the evening of 20 January 1950, Potts visited Orwell and slipped away on finding him asleep. Jack Harrison visited later and claimed that Orwell gave him 25% of the company. Early on the morning of 21 January, an artery burst in Orwell's lungs, killing him at age 46.
George Orwell
22092085#4
It is not known precisely when the article was written. Peter Davison, editor of Orwell's "Collected Works", has suggested a possible history for its composition that places its writing between 1931 and 1936 – a time when Orwell's work revolved around the unemployed, tramps and beggars – reworked it between summer 1940 and spring 1941, – submitted it to "Horizon" – but it was rejected – possibly because readers would have been unwilling to read about 'how the poor die' at such a time – and finally, a section retyped and then published in "Now", a magazine established by George Woodcock, in November 1946.
How the Poor Die
22092085#5
Orwell recounts a tale based on his experiences in a public funded hospital in Paris. The various reception procedures and treatments he receives for pneumonia include bureaucracy, a bath, cupping therapy and a mustard poultice. In the ward he notes the indifference of the staff to their patients, in particular when they are used as case studies for medical training. The death of "numero 57" sets Orwell wondering how lucky it is to die a natural death, or rather, as he thinks at the time of writing, and as he thought then, if is it better to die violently and not too old. Orwell sees his experiences in the French hospital, and in a Spanish hospital, in stark contrast to the care he received in an English cottage hospital.
How the Poor Die
22092085#2
In December 1933, while Orwell was teaching in Uxbridge, he developed pneumonia. He was taken to a cottage hospital at Uxbridge where for a time his life was believed to be in danger. He was kept in hospital over Christmas and the New Year. When he was discharged in January 1934, he returned to Southwold to convalesce and was supported by his parents for several months. He did not return to teaching.
How the Poor Die
11891#61
Orwell had requested to be buried in accordance with the Anglican rite in the graveyard of the closest church to wherever he happened to die. The graveyards in central London had no space, and fearing that he might have to be cremated against his wishes, his widow appealed to his friends to see whether any of them knew of a church with space in its graveyard.
David Astor lived in Sutton Courtenay, Oxfordshire, and arranged for Orwell to be interred in the churchyard of All Saints' there. Orwell's gravestone bears the simple epitaph: "Here lies Eric Arthur Blair, born June 25th 1903, died January 21st 1950"; no mention is made on the gravestone of his more famous pen name.
George Orwell
11891#15
He fell seriously ill in February 1929 and was taken to the Hôpital Cochin in the 14th arrondissement, a free hospital where medical students were trained. His experiences there were the basis of his essay "How the Poor Die", published in 1946. He chose not to identify the hospital, and indeed was deliberately misleading about its location. Shortly afterwards, he had all his money stolen from his lodging house. Whether through necessity or to collect material, he undertook menial jobs such as dishwashing in a fashionable hotel on the rue de Rivoli, which he later described in "Down and Out in Paris and London". In August 1929, he sent a copy of "The Spike" to John Middleton Murry's "New Adelphi" magazine in London. The magazine was edited by Max Plowman and Sir Richard Rees, and Plowman accepted the work for publication.
George Orwell
11891#57
Orwell returned to London in late 1946 and picked up his literary journalism again. Now a well-known writer, he was swamped with work. Apart from a visit to Jura in the new year he stayed in London for one of the coldest British winters on record and with such a national shortage of fuel that he burnt his furniture and his child's toys. The heavy smog in the days before the Clean Air Act 1956 did little to help his health about which he was reticent, keeping clear of medical attention. Meanwhile, he had to cope with rival claims of publishers Gollancz and Warburg for publishing rights. About this time he co-edited a collection titled "British Pamphleteers" with Reginald Reynolds. As a result of the success of "Animal Farm", Orwell was expecting a large bill from the Inland Revenue and he contacted a firm of accountants of which the senior partner was Jack Harrison. The firm advised Orwell to establish a company to own his copyright and to receive his royalties and set up a "service agreement" so that he could draw a salary. Such a company "George Orwell Productions Ltd" (GOP Ltd) was set up on 12 September 1947 although the service agreement was not then put into effect. Jack Harrison left the details at this stage to junior colleagues.
George Orwell
11891#47
At the end of August he had a dinner with H. G. Wells which degenerated into a row because Wells had taken offence at observations Orwell made about him in a "Horizon" article. In October Orwell had a bout of bronchitis and the illness recurred frequently. David Astor was looking for a provocative contributor for "The Observer" and invited Orwell to write for him – the first article appearing in March 1942. In early 1942 Eileen changed jobs to work at the Ministry of Food and in mid-1942 the Orwells moved to a larger flat, a ground floor and basement, 10a Mortimer Crescent in Maida Vale/Kilburn – "the kind of lower-middle-class ambience that Orwell thought was London at its best." Around the same time Orwell's mother and sister Avril, who had found work in a sheet-metal factory behind King's Cross Station, moved into a flat close to George and Eileen.
George Orwell