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Orwell: The Road to Airstrip One
"It is doubtful that any book provides a better foundation for a full
understanding of Orwell's unique and troubling vision."
- The Washington Post
"The best introduction I know of to the life and ideas of George Orwell,
[written] with insight, intelligence, and imagination."
- Peter Stansky, Stanford University
"Penetrating and illuminating - one of the few treatments of Orwell which is
at once completely informed and freshly intelligent."
- Robert Conquest, Hoover Institution
"ORWELL: THE ROAD TO AIRSTRIP ONE" REVISED AND RELEASED FOR
GEORGE ORWELL'S CENTENARY AND A MOST TUMULTUOUS TIME IN MODERN HISTORY
(Vancouver) - During the centenary of George Orwell's birth (b. 1903),
author Ian Slater is once again celebrated for his definitive biography of
the man who coined the terms "cold war," and "big brother." In its time,
"Orwell: The Road To Airstrip One" (McGill-Queen's University Press), was
heralded by critics as an "insightful" and "intelligent," capturing the
essence of a essayist and journalist better known outside of the United
Kingdom for his novels.
A quarter century ago, McLean's magazine pronounced Ian Slater's novel,
"Firespill," "the right book at the right time in the right place." The
same could now be said of the revised edition of Slater's "Orwell: The Road
to Airstrip One." The first edition garnered fullsome praise for its unusual
thematic approach in which Slater, a prolific novelist as well as an
academic, examines Orwell's self-criticism and the hidden and corrosive
dangers of state-and self-imposed censorship in a security-obsessed world.
Accolades for the book poured in from the Washington Post to the Times
Literary Supplement's "Perhaps it is because Ian Slater is a Canadian,
removed from what he is writing about by a continent.that he looks at
familiar material so freshly.with such zestful springiness that he often
sees things newly." In the American South, which Slater reveals Orwell
wanted to visit and write about, the Atlanta Journal and Constitution lauded
the book's "tight sense of development," arguing that Slater's experience as
a novelist is "a unique, and I think critical, bonus because it puts him in
a position to understand the creative writer's struggle and because he knows
how to make his book a fluid pleasure to read. In his disdain for convoluted
academic writing, Slater has written a book that is accessible and will have
broad appeal."
What makes Slater's book stand out from a plethora of other biographies is
how he makes a lively and convincing case that Orwell's "Nineteen
Eighty-Four" is as much a warning about a totalitarian state of mind as an
actual political state. As "The War On Terrorism" continues and governments
demand ever-increasing power over the individual in order to combat
terrorism, Slater's book clearly explains the insidious processes by which
we as individuals harbour the totalitarian mind during times of personal and
collective crises - how "he who fights monsters should be careful lest he
thereby become a monster." (Nietzsche).
Perhaps more than any other book on Orwell, "Orwell: The Road to Airstrip
One" is the book for our times, for as the Globe and Mail declared, "Slater
has provided a succinct yet thorough guide to the work of this dour and
incorruptible man. He has done his homework; he knows the canon and the
secondary material about Orwell inside out." In Slater's revised version,
his new preface contains a true story that Slater was part of and which is
at once so moving about the power of one good, brave man and the power of
literature to change events that it alone is worth the price of the book.
understanding of Orwell's unique and troubling vision."
- The Washington Post
"The best introduction I know of to the life and ideas of George Orwell,
[written] with insight, intelligence, and imagination."
- Peter Stansky, Stanford University
"Penetrating and illuminating - one of the few treatments of Orwell which is
at once completely informed and freshly intelligent."
- Robert Conquest, Hoover Institution
"ORWELL: THE ROAD TO AIRSTRIP ONE" REVISED AND RELEASED FOR
GEORGE ORWELL'S CENTENARY AND A MOST TUMULTUOUS TIME IN MODERN HISTORY
(Vancouver) - During the centenary of George Orwell's birth (b. 1903),
author Ian Slater is once again celebrated for his definitive biography of
the man who coined the terms "cold war," and "big brother." In its time,
"Orwell: The Road To Airstrip One" (McGill-Queen's University Press), was
heralded by critics as an "insightful" and "intelligent," capturing the
essence of a essayist and journalist better known outside of the United
Kingdom for his novels.
A quarter century ago, McLean's magazine pronounced Ian Slater's novel,
"Firespill," "the right book at the right time in the right place." The
same could now be said of the revised edition of Slater's "Orwell: The Road
to Airstrip One." The first edition garnered fullsome praise for its unusual
thematic approach in which Slater, a prolific novelist as well as an
academic, examines Orwell's self-criticism and the hidden and corrosive
dangers of state-and self-imposed censorship in a security-obsessed world.
Accolades for the book poured in from the Washington Post to the Times
Literary Supplement's "Perhaps it is because Ian Slater is a Canadian,
removed from what he is writing about by a continent.that he looks at
familiar material so freshly.with such zestful springiness that he often
sees things newly." In the American South, which Slater reveals Orwell
wanted to visit and write about, the Atlanta Journal and Constitution lauded
the book's "tight sense of development," arguing that Slater's experience as
a novelist is "a unique, and I think critical, bonus because it puts him in
a position to understand the creative writer's struggle and because he knows
how to make his book a fluid pleasure to read. In his disdain for convoluted
academic writing, Slater has written a book that is accessible and will have
broad appeal."
What makes Slater's book stand out from a plethora of other biographies is
how he makes a lively and convincing case that Orwell's "Nineteen
Eighty-Four" is as much a warning about a totalitarian state of mind as an
actual political state. As "The War On Terrorism" continues and governments
demand ever-increasing power over the individual in order to combat
terrorism, Slater's book clearly explains the insidious processes by which
we as individuals harbour the totalitarian mind during times of personal and
collective crises - how "he who fights monsters should be careful lest he
thereby become a monster." (Nietzsche).
Perhaps more than any other book on Orwell, "Orwell: The Road to Airstrip
One" is the book for our times, for as the Globe and Mail declared, "Slater
has provided a succinct yet thorough guide to the work of this dour and
incorruptible man. He has done his homework; he knows the canon and the
secondary material about Orwell inside out." In Slater's revised version,
his new preface contains a true story that Slater was part of and which is
at once so moving about the power of one good, brave man and the power of
literature to change events that it alone is worth the price of the book.
Submitted on October 7, 2003 in By David.
