During the second impeachment hearing for Donald Trump, a woman with a sense of irony shared this line from George Orwell’s novel, 1984 on her Facebook page. The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.  The quote garn

Writer Geoff Dyer recounts a lunch where George Orwell’s wife, Sonia, and her husband’s biographer, Bernard Crick, almost came to blows over whether the famous writer did or didn’t shoot an elephant in Burma. (Nothing But,” by Geoff Dyer, Harper’s, May 2018, pgs. 73-74.)  A

 If writers have one reason to rejoice in Donald Trump’s victory over Hillary Clinton in the 2016 US Presidential election, it’s that he’s revived the book publishing business.  That’s Alex Sheppard’s opinion. (“It Takes a Pillage,” by Alex Sheppard, New Republic, Aug/

Subliminal messaging contends the unconscious mind can be reached by tricking the conscious one. Want to sell more popcorn at the movies? Flash popcorn on the screen fast enough so that the word seems invisible and wait by the cash register for your customers. The theory had its heyda

I came across another example of the way our government parses words to obscure rather than clarify meaning.  In the past, readers may recall I had an exchange with a former staff member for Under Secretary of Defense, Paul Wolfowitz, who served in the George W. Bush administration.�

Those of us who stand at the bottom of their climb to literary success may be surprised to learn that established writers continue to face rejection once they’ve made it to the top. Having produced 4 novels, George Orwell found it nearly impossible to publish Animal Farm, for exampl

I received an email this morning which looked like a reply from an literary agent. Surprised to hear from her after so long an interval, I opened the message with my heart aflutter.  “Hello,” the greeting began. That no name was appended to the salutation was a clue this was a pi

In the introduction to a new volume of George Orwell’s diaries, Christopher Hitchens, recently deceased, drew insights from the man whom many consider to be one of the greatest thinkers of the 20th century. Almost everyone has read at least one of Orwell’s social commentaries, Ani