For those who think the BBC is the overseas version of our own mainstream media, there might be reason to pause in this opinion. A proposed George Orwell statue, funded by the George Orwell Memorial Trust and by numerious British journalists, to be erected on outside the BBC offices has been denied by the BBC. Their reported reason is that Orwell was “too leftwing.”
The real reason, given the liberal tinge of the organization, might be how Orwell used his wartime experiences as a BBC broadcaster for source material. From 1941-43, Orwell produced anti-fascist broadcasts specifically to India.
When writing Nineteen Eighty-Four, Orwell had his character Winston Smith be a propaganda broadcaster for Big Brother. He also used the conference room for staff meetings at the BBC, designated room 101, for the torture chambers used by the regime.
Orwell, however, didn’t dislike the BBC. He thought their wartime censorship reasonable and didn’t have qualms about any editing of his broadcasts. His main reason for quitting was because he felt that his broadcasts were reaching a large Indian audience and he also wanted time to write.
– rejected in his own country.
Orwell, a man best known for critizing leftist totalitarianism and lack of things like free speech and thought… too leftwing? or too emabarassing to the politically-correct, multi-culti and spineless groupthink that is the BBC today?
“His main reason for quitting was because he felt that his broadcasts were reaching a large Indian audience….”
Is it possible that you lost a “not” in that sentence? It’s a pretty rare broadcaster that is put off by reaching a large audience. More often the broadcaster’s employer kills a show because it reaches too SMALL an audience.
I rather suspect Orwell’s statue was rejected because he wasn’t left wing enough. He started out as a Far Leftist and even fought in the Spanish Civil War on the Republican (leftist) side despite his poor health. But he saw many things there that soured him on the Far Left, especially the influence of Stalin’s advisers on the (Spanish) Republicans, particularly their purges (executions) of the POUM (the Spanish acronym for the Trotskyites). This turned him against Stalin and made him a democratic Socialist, which he stayed until his death.