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Orwell's Roses

Orwell's Roses

by Rebecca Solnit

Viking ·2021 ·308 pages
Near the Top
Near the Top
I Index
60/99
Maybe Someday

43/99

Critics' Rating Index

Top of the Pile

76/99

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About This Book

A lush exploration of roses, pleasure, and politics, and a fresh take on George Orwell as an avid gardener whose political writing was grounded in his passion for the natural world "In the year 1936 a writer planted roses." So begins Rebecca Solnit's new book, a reflection on George Orwell's passionate gardening and the way that his involvement with plants, particularly flowers, and the natural world illuminates his other commitments as a writer and antifascist, and the intertwined politics of nature and power. Sparked by her unexpected encounter with the surviving roses he planted in 1936, Solnit's account of this understudied aspect of Orwell's life explores his writing and his actions—from going deep into the coal mines of England, fighting in the Spanish Civil War, critiquing Stalin when much of the international left still supported him (and then critiquing that left), to his analysis of the relationship between lies and authoritarianism. Through Solnit's celebrated ability to draw unexpected connections, readers encounter the photographer Tina Modotti's roses and her Stalinism, Stalin's obsession with forcing lemons to grow in impossibly cold conditions, Orwell's slave-owning ancestors in Jamaica, Jamaica Kincaid's critique of colonialism and imperialism in the flower garden, and the brutal rose industry in Colombia that supplies the American market. The book draws to a close with a rereading of Nineteen Eighty-Four that completes her portrait of a more hopeful Orwell, as well as a reflection on pleasure, beauty, and joy as acts of resistance.


Reviews

"This is in part due to Solnit's nose for a good story, but also because, especially in this book, she artfully trains her branching offshoots on a supportive trellis ..."

HELLER MCALPIN· Los Angeles Times Read review ↗ Top of the Pile

"Orwell will always be relied on for his astute understanding of the threat of totalitarianism and its malignant lies; Solnit also ensures that we'll value Orwell's profound understanding of how love, pleasure, and awe for nature can be powerful forms of resistance."

Donna Seaman· Booklist Read review ↗ Top of the Pile

"I won't give away how Solnit rescues her portrait of Orwell from the bear trap she has sprung on it."

Suzannah Lessard· The New York Times Read review ↗ Top of the Pile

"Instead we are presented with a farrago of Solnit's own, often abstruse concerns ..."

John Carey· The Times (UK) Read review ↗ Bottom of the Pile

"an extraordinary mixture of heterogeneous ideas yoked together not exactly by violence but by curiosity, happenstance and a fair amount of perseverance."

Margaret Drabble· Times Literary Supplement Read review ↗ Near the Top

"[A] lyrical exploration."

Publishers Weekly Read review ↗ Top of the Pile

"Regardless, readers of the early 21st century should be grateful for her clear-eyed, articulate presence in our midst."

Harvey Freedenberg· Shelf Awareness Read review ↗ Near the Top

"While she does, in general, see Orwell's misogyny, Solnit doesn't—to quote her response to his roses—'think enough about what that meant' ..."

Frances Wilson· New York Review of Books Read review ↗ Maybe Someday

"It's not easy to find new angles on such a prominent figure, but Rebecca Solnit has done just that."

Kevin Canfield· San Francisco Chronicle Read review ↗ Top of the Pile

"Solnit seems especially exercised by the apparent contradiction between a progressive political standpoint and the pursuit of personal pleasure."

D. J. Taylor· The Wall Street Journal Read review ↗ Top of the Pile

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