George Orwell repeatedly delayed crucial medical care to complete 1984, the book still synonymous with our worst fears of a totalitarian future — published 70 years ago this month. Half a year after his novel’s debut, he was dead. Because he believed everything was at stake, he forfeited everything, including a young son, a devoted sister, a wife of three months and a grateful public that canonized his prescient and pressing novel. Read More...
To disappear from the world as you know it and escape to something else—Who hasn’t heard that siren call? It’s long been a theme in the work of The Things They Carried author Tim O’Brien, reluctant bard of the Vietnam War and soldier-poet of the baby boomers. He disappeared a bit himself a while back, stopped publishing and became a father of two boys, finding a fulfilling existence as a teacher in the quiet Texas suburbs. Read More...
