WHO WAS EILEEN BLAIR?
Eileen Blair was author George Orwell’s first wife. The famed writer married Eileen O’Shaughnessy in 1936 and this lasted until 1945 – when she passed away aged only 39.
He married his second wife Sonia Brownell in 1949, but died weeks later.
Eileen was born in South Shields and, being an excellent student, got a scholarship to study English at Oxford, where one of her tutors was JRR Tolkien. Later, she went on to do a course in educational psychology at University College London.
Her youth saw her taking a series of different jobs – including an assistant mistress at a girl’s boarding school, a secretary, freelance journalist and even reader for Dame Elizabeth Cadbury, whose husband George manufactured the infamous chocolate.
Eileen Blair, pictured, was author George Orwell’s first wife. The famed writer married Eileen O’Shaughnessy in 1936 and this lasted until 1945 – when she passed away aged only 39
During the Second World War, she worked for the Ministry of Information’s Censorship Department as well as the Ministry of Food.
She and Orwell met at a party through mutual friends in 1935 and the couple were wed at St Mary’s Church in Wallington, Hertfordshire the following year.
The pair were both in Spain during the Spanish Civil War – but by 1937, had to flee as the political situation made them targets.
She and Orwell had one child – a boy called Richard Horatio, who they adopted at three weeks old in 1944.
HOW DID EILEEN DIE?
Eileen died while in surgery in 1945. However, not much is known about her declining health.
It is understood the operation during which she died was meant to be for the removal of her uterus.
Orwell’s loneliness following the passing of his wife is well documented, and he was known to have proposed to several women afterwards – some on only first meeting.
HOW MUCH DO WE KNOW ABOUT EILEEN?
In her latest book Wifedom – which is a ‘hybrid of biography and memoir’, according to ABC.net.au – Anna Funder makes the point that little is known about Eileen’s short life save for a biting look into her seemingly less than stellar marriage through a series of letters.
Writing for The Guardian, Anna admitted that the six pieces of correspondence to her best friend Norah Symes left her floored with the insight into Orwell’s elusive wife.
Of particular curiosity was one where Eileen apologises for not writing sooner after her marriage ‘because they quarrelled so continuously & really bitterly’.
‘I thought I’d save time & just write one letter to everyone when the murder or separation had been accomplished,’ she added.
One biography by Bernard Crick shows that in one letter to Ann Popham – a woman he had proposed to – Orwell (pictured) explained he was ‘sometimes unfaithful to Eileen’
In her latest book Wifedom – which is a ‘hybrid of biography and memoir’, according to ABC.net.au – Anna Funder (pictured) makes the point that little is known about Eileen’s short life
According to ABC.net.au, Anna embarked on a forensic investigation of Orwell’s biographies and works to find Eileen – and while history looks to have buried her as a passive recipient of her husband’s genius, a different picture of a smart, astute and politically active woman emerged.
‘A more monumental disappearing trick happens in Homage to Catalonia,’ she told The Guardian.
‘One of my favourite books since my teens. You can read it again and again and barely register that Orwell was not in Spain alone – Eileen was there too, almost the whole time.’
Not only was she there, Anna says – but she was actively working at the Independent Labour Party (ILP) headquarters and running ‘communication and supply for all the men at the trenches’.
DID EILEEN AND ORWELL HAVE A GOOD MARRIAGE?
The couple’s union is famously reported to have been complicated and wrought by infidelity.
One review of Anna’s book by the Independent even dubs Orwell a ‘cruel husband’.
‘After Spain, their marriage teeters on the edge of breakdown. Is it an “open relationship”, or should they adopt a baby? Is Eileen’s bleeding to do with her body or her soul?
‘While her peculiar husband chases other women in a of seedy machismo, does she any longer care if she’s alive or dead?’ it questions.
One biography by Bernard Crick shows that in one letter to Ann Popham – a woman he had proposed to – Orwell explained he was ‘sometimes unfaithful to Eileen’.
‘And I also treated her badly,’ he continued. ‘And I think she treated me badly, too, at times, but it was a real marriage, in the sense that we had been through awful struggles together and she understood all about my work, etc.’
According to letters discovered in 2020, Eileen wanted him to have sex with an old flame twice a year in order to ‘keep him happy’ in his ‘long-suffering’ life.
Orwell’s loneliness following the passing of his wife is well documented, and he was known to have proposed to several women afterwards – some on first meeting
A batch of around 30 letters which chart conversations between Orwell and Brenda Salkeld made the shocking revelation.
The Animal Farm and 1984 author penned a note to Salkeld on the day after his first wedding and he continued to write to her until 1949, days before his second wedding.
According to the Times, one letter which was penned by Orwell four years after he married Eileen, stated that she understood his needs and wanted her husband to sleep with Salkeld.
‘She wished I could sleep with you about twice a year, just to keep me happy’, the letter read.
The letters between the author and Salkeld show how he would use her to thrash out his ideas.
The revelation of this set of letters came just months after letters between Orwell and Eleanor Jaques had surfaced.
Mr Blair had since said that he has purchased all letters from the descendants of the recipients and that he would be donating them to University College London, which is home to the George Orwell Archive.
He said it was clear the women had more influence on his father than it had previously been claimed and one letter revealed Orwell’s humiliation at Brownell’s initial rejection of him and that he only put up with it because he was ‘long-suffering’.
Earlier letters to Salkeld reveal his feelings towards her and he tells her that if she should take a love, he doesn’t see why ‘it shouldn’t be me’.
Orwell died in January 1950 and the correspondence had continued until the September before his death.
He told her he would be married again, this time to Brownell and believed she would be ‘astonished’, due to his ‘health being as it is’.
Mr Blair added that the letters had been very personal and suggested that there had been ‘physical contact from time to time’.
He added that his father liked women with a ‘strong opinion’ and it was this that attracted him to them.
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