George Orwell

George Orwell was born Eric Arthur Blair on June 25, 1903. Orwell is best known for his literature in opposition to totalitarianism and repression. Surprisingly, Orwell's family did not have a lot of money, even though he was born into a wealthy lineage. At the age of one his mother, Ida Blair, moved to England from India, Orwell's birthplace, with her son. Orwell attended Catholic private school, and later studied at Eton College, where he had Aldous Huxley as a French professor. Orwell then became a teacher, all the while writing numerous works of various literature, many of which were originally rejected by publishers. On June 9, 1936 Orwell married Eileen O'Shaughnessy. In December of the same year, Orwell travelled to Spain to help fight in the Spanish Civil War. He saw live action on the front, and was eventually shot in the neck. Upon recovering, Orwell found that he and his friends were being persecuted as fascists, and left Spain. As World War One raged, Orwell published one of his most noteworthy novels, Animal Farm, a satire of the Soviet Republic. Later, in 1949, he published Nineteen Eighty-Four. After the death of Orwell's wife, (whom he had cheated on) he married Sonia Brownell, who acted as a mother to his son, Richard, in the hospital where he was staying. On January 21, 1950, Orwell died following an arterial burst in his lungs.