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Keep the Aspidistra Flying
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London, 1936. Gordon Comstock has declared war on the money god; and Gordon is losing the war. Nearly 30 and "rather moth-eaten already," a poet whose one small book of verse has fallen "flatter than any pancake," Gordon has given up a "good" job and gone to work in a bookshop at half his former salary. Always broke, but too proud to accept charity, he rarely sees his few friends and cannot get the virginal Rosemary to bed because (or so he believes), "If you have no money ... women won't love you." On the windowsill of Gordon's shabby rooming-house room is a sickly but unkillable aspidistra--a plant he abhors as the banner of the sort of "mingy, lower-middle-class decency" he is fleeing in his downward flight.
In Keep the Aspidistra Flying, George Orwell has created a darkly compassionate satire to which anyone who has ever been oppressed by the lack of brass, or by the need to make it, will all too easily relate. He etches the ugly insanity of what Gordon calls "the money-world" in unflinching detail, but the satire has a second edge, too, and Gordon himself is scarcely heroic. In the course of his misadventures, we become grindingly aware that his radical solution to the problem of the money-world is no solution at all--that in his desperate reaction against a monstrous system, he has become something of a monster himself.
Orwell keeps both of his edges sharp to the very end--a "happy" ending that poses tough questions about just how happy it really is. That the book itself is not sour, but constantly fresh and frequently funny, is the result of Orwell's steady, unsentimental attention to the telling detail; his dry, quiet humor; his fascination with both the follies and the excellences of his characters; and his courageous refusal to embrace the comforts of any easy answer.
In Keep the Aspidistra Flying, George Orwell has created a darkly compassionate satire to which anyone who has ever been oppressed by the lack of brass, or by the need to make it, will all too easily relate. He etches the ugly insanity of what Gordon calls "the money-world" in unflinching detail, but the satire has a second edge, too, and Gordon himself is scarcely heroic. In the course of his misadventures, we become grindingly aware that his radical solution to the problem of the money-world is no solution at all--that in his desperate reaction against a monstrous system, he has become something of a monster himself.
Orwell keeps both of his edges sharp to the very end--a "happy" ending that poses tough questions about just how happy it really is. That the book itself is not sour, but constantly fresh and frequently funny, is the result of Orwell's steady, unsentimental attention to the telling detail; his dry, quiet humor; his fascination with both the follies and the excellences of his characters; and his courageous refusal to embrace the comforts of any easy answer.
297 pages, Paperback
First published January 1,1936
This edition
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297 pages, Paperback
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October 26, 2000 by Penguin Books Ltd
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- ASIN
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- Language
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English
Characters More characters
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Gordon Comstock
Would-be poet, anti-capitalist, middle-class....
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Philip Ravelston
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Julia Comstock
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Hermione Slater
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Mrs Wisbeach
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About the author
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Eric Arthur Blair was an English novelist, poet, essayist, journalist and critic who wrote under the pen name of George Orwell. His work is characterised by lucid prose, social criticism, opposition to all totalitarianism (both authoritarian communism and fascism), and support of democratic socialism.
Orwell is best known for his allegorical novella Animal Farm (1945) and the dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), although his works also encompass literary criticism, poetry, fiction and polemical journalism. His non-fiction works, including The Road to Wigan Pier (1937), documenting his experience of working-class life in the industrial north of England, and Homage to Catalonia (1938), an account of his experiences soldiering for the Republican faction of the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939), are as critically respected as his essays on politics, literature, language and culture.
Orwell's work remains influential in popular culture and in political culture, and the adjective "Orwellian"—describing totalitarian and authoritarian social practices—is part of the English language, like many of his neologisms, such as "Big Brother", "Thought Police", "Room 101", "Newspeak", "memory hole", "doublethink", and "thoughtcrime". In 2008, The Times named Orwell the second-greatest British writer since 1945.
Orwell is best known for his allegorical novella Animal Farm (1945) and the dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), although his works also encompass literary criticism, poetry, fiction and polemical journalism. His non-fiction works, including The Road to Wigan Pier (1937), documenting his experience of working-class life in the industrial north of England, and Homage to Catalonia (1938), an account of his experiences soldiering for the Republican faction of the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939), are as critically respected as his essays on politics, literature, language and culture.
Orwell's work remains influential in popular culture and in political culture, and the adjective "Orwellian"—describing totalitarian and authoritarian social practices—is part of the English language, like many of his neologisms, such as "Big Brother", "Thought Police", "Room 101", "Newspeak", "memory hole", "doublethink", and "thoughtcrime". In 2008, The Times named Orwell the second-greatest British writer since 1945.
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Per vieno veikėjo principinę vidinę dramą Orvelas puikiai atspindi primygtinį kapitalizmo visuotinumą ir pinigų valdomos visuomenės ydas. Iš pažiūros, individas kaip ir laisvas, kol veikia kapitalizmo rėmuose. Kažkaip išeiti už jų -- kaip ir neįmanoma. Tiksliau, teoriškai gal ir įmanoma, bet tuomet turi atsisakyti gyventi visuomenėje ir būti visiškas atsiskyrėlis.
Gordonas bandė kažkaip suderinti savo pasišlykštėjimą kapitalizmu ir atsisakymą žaisti pagal jo taisykles su noru visavertiškai dalyvauti visuomenės gyvenime. Buvo labai sunku jausti jam empatiją, nes jo elgesys atrodė nebrandus, destruktyvus ir, rodos, visiškai nenuoseklus. Kita vertus, toks pagrindinio veikėjo vaizdavimas kaip tik sudaro realumo įspūdį ir per jį lengva pajusti situacijos beviltiškumą.
Beje, knyga labai gerai surezonavo su šiuo metu skaitoma Frommo "Pabėgti iš laisvės", kurioje nagrinėjamas keblus individo santykis su asmenine laisve.
p. 53 Gordon jau žinojo, kur jų bėda: ne tiek tai, kad jie neturi pinigų, o tai, kad neturėdami pinigų jie mintimis toliau gyvena pinigų pasaulyje - pasaulyje, kuriame pinigai yra dorybė, skurdas - nusikaltimas. Juos žlugdo ne pats skurdas, o baimė atrodyti skurdžiais. Jie pripažįsta pinigų kodeksą, ir pagal tą kodeksą jaučiasi esą nevykėliai. Jiems neužtenka proto atsikvošėti ir tiesiog pradėti ~gyventi~, su pinigais ar be jų, kaip kad gyvena žemesnės klasės. Kokios jos teisios, tos žemesnės klasės! Nukelkime kepurę prieš fabriko darbininką, kuris, gaudamas skatikus, vis užtaiso savo merginai linksmas dienas! Jo gyslomis bent jau teka kraujas, ne pinigai.
Gordonas bandė kažkaip suderinti savo pasišlykštėjimą kapitalizmu ir atsisakymą žaisti pagal jo taisykles su noru visavertiškai dalyvauti visuomenės gyvenime. Buvo labai sunku jausti jam empatiją, nes jo elgesys atrodė nebrandus, destruktyvus ir, rodos, visiškai nenuoseklus. Kita vertus, toks pagrindinio veikėjo vaizdavimas kaip tik sudaro realumo įspūdį ir per jį lengva pajusti situacijos beviltiškumą.
Beje, knyga labai gerai surezonavo su šiuo metu skaitoma Frommo "Pabėgti iš laisvės", kurioje nagrinėjamas keblus individo santykis su asmenine laisve.
p. 53 Gordon jau žinojo, kur jų bėda: ne tiek tai, kad jie neturi pinigų, o tai, kad neturėdami pinigų jie mintimis toliau gyvena pinigų pasaulyje - pasaulyje, kuriame pinigai yra dorybė, skurdas - nusikaltimas. Juos žlugdo ne pats skurdas, o baimė atrodyti skurdžiais. Jie pripažįsta pinigų kodeksą, ir pagal tą kodeksą jaučiasi esą nevykėliai. Jiems neužtenka proto atsikvošėti ir tiesiog pradėti ~gyventi~, su pinigais ar be jų, kaip kad gyvena žemesnės klasės. Kokios jos teisios, tos žemesnės klasės! Nukelkime kepurę prieš fabriko darbininką, kuris, gaudamas skatikus, vis užtaiso savo merginai linksmas dienas! Jo gyslomis bent jau teka kraujas, ne pinigai.
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I haven't yet read Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London, a supposedly excellent autobiographical account of a middle-class man's descent into abject poverty, but I would imagine that some of the experiences Orwell describes in that book must have served him equally well in writing Keep the Aspidistra Flying, which must rank among the bleakest novels about self-induced poverty ever written in the English language.
Keep the Aspidistra Flying centres on Gordon Comstock, a talented twenty-nine-year-old writer who has renounced a successful career in advertising -- not just to get some serious writing done, but on general principle. Gordon, you see, hates money. More specifically, he hates the English middle class's slavish devotion to money and all the things it stands for. Refusing to serve the money god any longer, Gordon steps out of the rat race, only steadily to sink into poverty. In his good moments he feels morally superior to the people surrounding him, whose petit-bourgeois gentility he despises; in his bad moments he realises that he himself is despicable and that his new-found 'freedom' will never make him a successful author, as poverty (which Orwell calls 'a spiritual sewer' and 'spiritual halitosis') leads not to creativity but rather to moral deadness, which is unconducive to being either creatively or socially successful. Needless to say, the increasingly squalid and unproductive Gordon soon begins to pity and loathe himself, to the point where his self-hatred threatens to poison his relationships with the few people with whom he is still in touch. The question is: can his loved ones get him to give up his dream of a money-independent existence before it's too late?
Keep the Aspidistra Flying features some black comedy and social satire, but even so the book is fairly depressing. Orwell expertly dissects the poor man's pride and paranoia, his nagging obsessions and insecurities, and his constant struggle between hope, optimism, envy, despair and self-loathing. No doubt many readers will find Gordon a frustrating and pig-headed protagonist (he is!), but being a slightly frustrated aspiring writer myself, I could sort of relate to him -- enough to acknowledge that he's a powerful creation. I also really appreciated the urgency of Orwell's writing. Many of his ideas on capitalism and poverty are repeated with great insistence throughout the novel, meaning Keep the Aspidistra Flying is hardly a very subtle read, but definitely a compelling one. Finally, I greatly enjoyed the colourful picture Orwell paints of 1930s England, where class is everything and where splendour and squalour go hand in hand. I didn't really care for Gordon's sudden change of heart in the final chapters, which seemed a bit pat to me, but even so, Keep the Aspidistra Flying struck me as an excellent book, full of powerful observations about writing and life in general that I wish I had come up with myself.
Talk about being a frustrated writer. :-)
Keep the Aspidistra Flying centres on Gordon Comstock, a talented twenty-nine-year-old writer who has renounced a successful career in advertising -- not just to get some serious writing done, but on general principle. Gordon, you see, hates money. More specifically, he hates the English middle class's slavish devotion to money and all the things it stands for. Refusing to serve the money god any longer, Gordon steps out of the rat race, only steadily to sink into poverty. In his good moments he feels morally superior to the people surrounding him, whose petit-bourgeois gentility he despises; in his bad moments he realises that he himself is despicable and that his new-found 'freedom' will never make him a successful author, as poverty (which Orwell calls 'a spiritual sewer' and 'spiritual halitosis') leads not to creativity but rather to moral deadness, which is unconducive to being either creatively or socially successful. Needless to say, the increasingly squalid and unproductive Gordon soon begins to pity and loathe himself, to the point where his self-hatred threatens to poison his relationships with the few people with whom he is still in touch. The question is: can his loved ones get him to give up his dream of a money-independent existence before it's too late?
Keep the Aspidistra Flying features some black comedy and social satire, but even so the book is fairly depressing. Orwell expertly dissects the poor man's pride and paranoia, his nagging obsessions and insecurities, and his constant struggle between hope, optimism, envy, despair and self-loathing. No doubt many readers will find Gordon a frustrating and pig-headed protagonist (he is!), but being a slightly frustrated aspiring writer myself, I could sort of relate to him -- enough to acknowledge that he's a powerful creation. I also really appreciated the urgency of Orwell's writing. Many of his ideas on capitalism and poverty are repeated with great insistence throughout the novel, meaning Keep the Aspidistra Flying is hardly a very subtle read, but definitely a compelling one. Finally, I greatly enjoyed the colourful picture Orwell paints of 1930s England, where class is everything and where splendour and squalour go hand in hand. I didn't really care for Gordon's sudden change of heart in the final chapters, which seemed a bit pat to me, but even so, Keep the Aspidistra Flying struck me as an excellent book, full of powerful observations about writing and life in general that I wish I had come up with myself.
Talk about being a frustrated writer. :-)
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Scegliere il proprio sogno e condurre una vita spesso sofferta o sceglier la rassicurante prospettiva di una vita standardizzata, già tracciata, nella quale la personalità sbiadisce sino a svanire e solo rimane un sentore profondamente impersonale? Un Orwell cantore della libertà personale, delle seducenti lusinghe che la vita borghese esterna, di un conflitto che vede ognuno di noi impegnato a comprendere (e scegliere) chi realmente vuol essere. Un libro per chi sogna di scrivere, per chi sogna di poter sognare, per chi, semplicemente, sogna.
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"The mistake you make, don't you see, is in thinking one can live in a corrupt society without being corrupt oneself. After all, what do you achieve by refusing to make money? You're trying to behave as though one could stand right outside our economic system. But one can't. One's got to change the system, or one changes nothing."
I thoroughly enjoyed this little book. If you like Orwell you will love Keep the Aspidistra Flying.
I thoroughly enjoyed this little book. If you like Orwell you will love Keep the Aspidistra Flying.
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Significativo e visionario.
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The novel is like "1984", a thesis novel. The author sets out to portray to us in great detail the monotony and smallness of Gordon's life and shows us page after page to what extent money governs every moment of the life of his "hero," despite his desperate attempt to extricate himself from the system. Suppose a form of boredom sometimes accompanies reading. In that case, insidious anguish seizes the reader when he realizes how poverty eats away at Gordon from within, at the risk of robbing him of his soul.
The reader quickly grasps the irony of the situation. By choosing to fight against money, Gordon paradoxically gets into a slump where lack of funds dictates his choices and defines him as a social, penniless friend with Ravelston and a chaste lover with Rosemary. At first glance, the novel's title, to say the least opaque, takes on its whole meaning: the aspidistra is a perennial plant, an integral part of every London household. It symbolizes a form of normality, of belonging to society. Gordon's hatred of the aspidistra, which in his eyes represents the system he refuses to be a part of, perfectly illustrates the author's chilling irony.
The reader quickly grasps the irony of the situation. By choosing to fight against money, Gordon paradoxically gets into a slump where lack of funds dictates his choices and defines him as a social, penniless friend with Ravelston and a chaste lover with Rosemary. At first glance, the novel's title, to say the least opaque, takes on its whole meaning: the aspidistra is a perennial plant, an integral part of every London household. It symbolizes a form of normality, of belonging to society. Gordon's hatred of the aspidistra, which in his eyes represents the system he refuses to be a part of, perfectly illustrates the author's chilling irony.
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Gordon Comstock is a truly insufferable bore to spend time with and this book whilst not a chore to read was pretty tame and predictable in nature. Comstock's arc from anti-capitalist to middle class conformist is essentially the same argument some douchey dudebro might make about lesbians - all they need is some good dick (see Chasing Amy for a popular example of said attitude explored by somebody half sensitive to the idea that it is the moron character who spouts it) and in this examle yes, Orwell is some douchey middle class pre-war dudebro who thinks that capitalism is a wonderful thing and all socialists need is educating, or their eyes opening to the sturdy goodness, because at heart everybody is an aspidistra flying capitalist.
Comstock is what Jarvis Cocker was singing about in Common People, he truly believes that the chipstains and grease are an option for the people he is slumming with, the way he simply has a bath and goes back to middle class capitalism has its parallels with the girl who can just call her dad and get him to wire her some more cash. A dreadful human being really. That it is apparently a semiautobiographical works tells me all I need to know about Orwell and will be enough of an explanation as to why I will not read any more of his nonsense.
Give me Patrick Hamilton or Julian MacLaren-Ross any day of the week over this flim-flam.
Comstock is what Jarvis Cocker was singing about in Common People, he truly believes that the chipstains and grease are an option for the people he is slumming with, the way he simply has a bath and goes back to middle class capitalism has its parallels with the girl who can just call her dad and get him to wire her some more cash. A dreadful human being really. That it is apparently a semiautobiographical works tells me all I need to know about Orwell and will be enough of an explanation as to why I will not read any more of his nonsense.
Give me Patrick Hamilton or Julian MacLaren-Ross any day of the week over this flim-flam.
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