Title: Orwell and Gissing
Description: This in-depth study reveals that Orwell drew heavily on the Gissing novels he admired in shaping his own. Gissing's New Grub Street and The Odd Women directly influenced Orwell's Depression-era novels Keep the Aspidistra Flying and A Clergyman's Daughter. Even Orwell's most imaginative work, Animal Farm, mirrors Gissing's own novel of a failed Socialist Utopia, Demos. Gissing was Orwell's role model and alter ego.

Gissing provided him with a touchstone to his beliefs, his pessimism, his love of Dickens and cozy corners, his suspicion of "progress," his restless sexuality. To understand Orwell fully, one must first read Gissing.
Subjects: Influence, History, Utopias in literature, Literature, Knowledge, Literature and society, Influence (Literary, artistic, etc.), English Authors, Biography, Dickens, charles, 1812-1870, Gissing, george, 1857-1903, Authors, english, Orwell, george, 1903-1950
Places: England
People: George Orwell (1903-1950), Charles Dickens (1812-1870), George Gissing (1857-1903)
Time periods: 20th century