Book Review: Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell

 

Homage to Catalonia

232 pages, Paperback

First published April, 1938

In the Pantheon of books, American young adults are forced to read there are not one but two stone-cold classics connected to George Orwell. I don’t need to the readers of this review about the importance of Orwell, whose mega classics Animal Farm and 1984 are pretty much household names even with non-reading nitwits who at least remember the names. It is interesting because this book his war-time memoir is easily Orwell’s most important book to me, it is the reason I read it again.
The first time I read it was as a young radical and much went over my head because it was my first exposure to the conflict of the Spanish Civil War. Since reading this book I have read several histories of the conflict, seen movies and documentaries and I had a father who was very invested in that history. We talked about each time one of us read a history on the subject.

That younger reader can to this book inspired by the idea that Orwell left England to write about the conflict and was inspired to join. I often think of this book in a similar vein to Frantz Fannon’s Wretched of the Earth, very different books but both follow an idealist sent to another country who is inspired to join the fight, Fannon against Imperialism, and Orwell against Fascism.

It is true looking back on the conflict, we can easily see the important piece Spain was in the global march of capitalism, but Orwell understood. He pointed out that one reason he was willing to fight was he was sick and tired of the fascists winning and in Europe one after another they were getting big victories.  

“All the war propaganda, all the screaming and lies, and hatred comes invariably from people who are not fighting.”

One of the things that makes this book a special wartime journal is that Orwell is a great writer, radical thinker and gives zero fucks about telling it as it was. The only part of the book that drags is still nonetheless important, When he breaks down all the various factions, sub-factions, and circular firing squads it shows the thin lines that hurt the anti-fascists in the greater conflict.

He also got a front seat to see how wars function and the class system that engages in it in various ways. Consider…

“It is the same in all wars; the soldiers do the fighting, the journalists do the shouting, and no true patriot ever gets near a front-line trench, except on the briefest of propaganda-tours.”

It remains true, think how many of the older flag-waving war-mongering political figures in America today avoided the war in southeast Asia but are very excited to send others to war. This book is a great read for anyone who wants to see how to classics of political fiction were radicalized in his actual experience. It is not all political thought and theory, it is also a well-written journal of wartime experience. From the boredom of waiting for something to happen, the terror of those moments, to suffering without supplies. Orwell puts you in this unique moment in history.
Most powerful is the moment when he thought he died…

“They laid me down again while somebody fetched a stretcher. As soon as I knew that the bullet had gone clean through my neck I took it for granted that I was done for. I had never heard of a man or an animal getting a bullet through the middle of the neck and surviving it. The blood was dribbling out of the corner of my mouth. ‘The artery's gone,’ I thought. I wondered how long you last when your carotid artery is cut; not many minutes, presumably. Everything was very blurry. There must have been about two minutes during which I assumed that I was killed. And that too was interesting—I mean it is interesting to know what your thoughts would be at such a time. My first thought, conventionally enough, was for my wife. My second was a violent resentment at having to leave this world which, when all is said and done, suits me so well. I had time to feel this very vividly."

Homage to Catalonia should be taught in schools just as much as Animal Farm and 1984, It is indeed Orwell’s most important book but it will never happen. This is a radical history and a must-read classic.