Keep the aspidistra flying

Despite hailing from a comfortable family background, budding poet Gordon Comstock decides to declare war on money and all the middle-class trappings that wealth can buy.

Working in a small bookshop and living in a bedsit in London, he dreams of completing an ambitious poem in rhyme royal and devoting his life to literature.

But when poverty begins to damage his self-esteem and taint his worldview, and his romantic and professional lives start falling apart, will Gordon be able to uphold his anti-money principles, or will he succumb to the lure of lucre and everything he stands against? First published in 1936, Keep the Aspidistra Flying is the author’s third novel, and one of his most outspoken works of social criticism.

Partly autobiographical, it sits alongside Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four as a reminder of Orwell’s lucid narrative style and his abilities as a politically and socially engaged writer.