Book review: Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell
Hello everybody and welcome back to another blog post,
As I'm sure many of you already know, I've been reading George Orwell's very influential book, Homage to Catalonia. Recently, I managed to finish reading it so today, I'll be doing a book review for you all! Enjoy!💜
At my school, the Spanish Civil War was never really part of our history course. All we ever really briefly touched upon, was the Nazi bombing of Geurnica but aside from that, our curriculum was primarily based on Germany, international relations, and many other things. Consequently, when I first started reading this book, it took me a while to realise what was going on. The writing style never really bothered me, it was mainly the information that I struggled to pick up at first. Why were the soldiers so badly equipped? Why was Orwell part of a communist-sympathising group? What was the difference between the POUM and the Communists? Who were all the Spanish people fighting against? These were questions that I was asking myself throughout the book but after reading it further and conducting my own research, I was able to find some simple answers. Hopefully this will help you if you've read the book or are thinking of doing so.
In short, the POUM, the far left socialist group that Orwell was fighting for, was the Spanish communist organisation. At the beginning of the civil war, the POUM was sent in as the fighting force for Spain, against General Franco's fascist front. Although they were initially rallied through the streets like heros, due to the lack of funding, resources and the fact that many of the soldiers were ill-trained volunteers before conscription was enforced, they soon lost support and were probably one of the weakest militias and armies on the Spanish side.
Although both the POUM and the Communists were far-left-favouring groups, they were not the same. Like many other Spanish groups and parties, they both fought against fascism and Franco but the Communists were mainly part of the Soviet Union and the POUM was more of a Marxist collaborated group that were often labelled as the "Trotskyists."
Orwell was part of the POUM and did have some left-supporting ideas but had mainly gone to Spain to "fight against fascism." However, he soon wrote this book when he got back from Spain after the POUM was declared an illegal organisation, because he wanted to make a point about the danger of authoritarian governments and totalitarianism in general.
This information really helped me to understand why this book was so influential and important. It shows us that fascist dictatorships like Franco's, have the power to corrupt the world we live in. However, the book more importantly shows that politics can cause people to turn on each other. The whole reason why the POUM was made illegal was because the Communists and other siding groups had turned on their allies because they began questioning the beliefs of the POUM. Due to this, the opposition to the fascists ended up fighting on two fronts because they began seeing enemies in each other. This shows that politics is powerful and that communism can be just as bad as fascism because they're both totalitarian governments, who don't listen to anyone but themselves. Therefore, this book shows us that democracy, where the people each have a say, can only be the best way to combat conflict. This is why this book is so important and I hope it continues to hit a chord with the world because there is still political struggle in many places. People are still suffering at the hands of authoritarian governments and totalitarianism, and that is really an issue that needs to be addressed.
"Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism as I understand it." - George Orwell - a quote that sums up Orwell's modern beliefs on totalitarianism.
Have you read Homage to Catalonia? Have you read any other book by Orwell? Let me know in the comments below and I'll be sure to reply to them. I ♡ hearing from you!
Tap one of the reaction boxes below to let me know what you thought of this post. It would really help me to make some improvements in the future!
Be sure to follow and subscribe so that you don't miss anymore of my brilliant posts and share this article with a friend who might enjoy it too!
See you next time,
Bye,
XOX, Juliette
My social media handles:
My main blog:
Previous post:
Comments
Post a Comment