June 9, 2006
Why We Write
It could be a symptom of psychological disorder — "making up stories and holding conversations with imaginary persons" — but that's how Orwell describes his own beginnings ("the lonely child's habit") in his nifty 1946 essay "Why I Write." Orwell settles on "four great motives for writing" and names them: sheer egoism, aesthetic enthusiasm, historical impulse, and political purpose. These four horses drove Eric Blair's prose.
A man for his season and ours, Orwell
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