Orwell and Gissing

Three generations of critics have commented on the parallels between George Orwell and his favorite novelist, George Gissing. «I am a great fan of his,» Orwell wrote in 1948, proclaiming «that England has produced very few better novelists.» This in-depth study reveals that Orwell drew heavily on the Gissing novels he admired in shaping his own. Gissing''s <I>New Grub Street</I> and <I>The Odd Women</I> directly influenced Orwell''s Depression-era novels <I>Keep the Aspidstra Flying</I> and <I>A Clergyman''s Daughter</I>. Even Orwell''s most imaginative work, <I>Animal Farm</I>, mirrors Gissing''s own novel of a failed Socialist Utopia, <I>Demos</I>. Gissing was Orwell''s role model and alter ego. Gissing provided him with a touchstone to his beliefs, his pessimism, his love of Dickens and cozy corners, his suspicion of «progress,» his restless sexuality. To understand Orwell fully, one must first read Gissing.