Orwell in Marrakech

George Orwell’s “blog,” the Orwell Diaries, is absolutely fascinating, even 70 years after the fact. I assume it’s because while it was written as a private diary, it was always presumed that it would eventually become public in one way or another. Either as anecdotes in an article, impressions and scenes for a novel or eventually post-humously. For all I know, he probably shared it with close associates or offered it to whomever asked to read it.

Unlike our own very public writing online, Orwell doesn’t indulge in privacy in his notes. There are no “overheards,” or gossip, or events and places aren’t treated as profound simply because they are personal. Today, I would treat a diary as somewhere to put what I couldn’t otherwise publish. This reads more like a reporter’s notebook — if that reporter was an amateur botanist, birder and socialist.

Point is, you’ll get days like this, when he offers fine details about the press, economics and living conditions while touring the streets of Marrakech in 1938. Ripe with detail and a certain self-awareness of being from the privileged class but unwilling to be of it. And then you’ll get an entry like this:

Distinctly cooler at night. Last night used blanket all night. Red hibiscus in flower.

Kind of sublime, really, especially as you realize just how long it will actually take for three years of such daily notes to unfurl, encompassing the early history of World War II. Makes for wonderful, and surprising, reading amidst much echo and blather in my RSS feeds.

A book you are allowed to buy

I had the good fortune to spend some time with my old friend Hank Willis Thomas last weekend, and basically begged him for a free copy of his new monograph. As much as I’d like to give Hank millions of dollars to create great art, I can barely afford his coffee-table book. That said, I’ll have a copy by hook or by crook soon enough. Meanwhile, if you buy it, he can make his capitalist publishers happy, and there’s no shame in that.

Yes, I’m promoting a book that I’m not even mentioned or pictured in. I’m banking on the fact that I’m captured as a cute, young boy deep in Hank’s archives and will turn up when some equally deluded and enthusiastic young kid researches the collection some day, fulfilling my vain hope of being interred as even a fringe member of Manhattan’s downtown art scene.

I’ll be at Chelsea’s Rush Arts Gallery on Friday, September 19th from 6pm to 8pm to see a show co-curated by Hank and his cousin Kalia Brooks featuring art from fellow friend Bayete Ross-Smith — which completes a former roommate trifecta. Check out the show if you’re in town, buy Hank’s book if you aren’t, and save some money for the good work on the way.