First published 2021
Rebecca Solnit begins with a writer who planted roses in 1936. That writer was George Orwell, and Solnit stumbled upon his surviving roses decades later. This discovery leads her to explore Orwell's neglected passion for gardening and his deep connection to the natural world. She argues that his love of plants and flowers reveals crucial aspects of his political commitments as both writer and antifascist. Solnit traces how nature and power intertwined throughout Orwell's life and work. She follows him into English coal mines, onto Spanish Civil War battlefields, and through his early critiques of Stalin. The book connects Orwell's botanical interests to broader themes of resistance, examining everything from photographer Tina Modotti's roses to Colombia's brutal flower industry. Solnit closes by rereading Nineteen Eighty-Four through this lens, revealing a more optimistic Orwell who saw beauty and joy as forms of political resistance.
Genres: literary-fiction, 20th-century, environment, biography-memoir, 21st-century, activism
Vibes: intimate, lyrical, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family
Setting: Colombia, English Coal Mines, Spain
Period: 1936, Nineteen Eighty-Four
Hardcover · Granta Publications Ltd