Suffering from tuberculosis, Orwell rent a cottage on a small island, where he continued his final work, “Nineteen Eighty-Four”. He began writing the political satire “Animal Farm”, which became a best-selling novel after publication in 1945. After leaving BBC he became editor of a left-wing newspaper called “Tribune”. Having to stay at home, he worked for the BBC from 1941 to 1943, where he had to write war propaganda. As an idealist, he would have liked to join the army when the Second World War started in 1939, but he was rejected because of his illness. In 1936, he left for Spain and fought in the civil war. By 1935 he could live on what he earned by writing. He had assumed the pen name George Orwell. In 1933, “Down and Out in Paris and London” was published. He supported himself by tutoring, and in 1932, he opened a small private school. In 19 Blair wrote “Down and Out in Paris and London” and began “Burmese Days”, in which he makes up his impressions from his life as a colonial. He went to Paris in 1928, where he started publishing articles as a professional writer. Having returned to England, he lived in the East End of London, where he experienced the lives of the poor. The climate had ruined his lungs, and so he suffered from pneumonia for many times during his life. Since he could not afford going to university and was not good enough to win a scholarship, Blair decided to join the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, where he stayed from 1922 to 1927 until he deserted. He went to Eton from 1917 to 1921, writing some essays and working on school magazines. Since the age of five, young Eric wanted to become a writer.

In 1907 his father sent the family back to England to protect them from the hard climate in India. His father worked for the British officials in Bengal. “George Orwell” was the pen name of Eric Arthur Blair.

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