Experienced biographer Jeffrey Meyers delves into the complex personal history of the man whose visionary work gave us the great anti-utopias of twentieth-century literature. Meyers draws on a close study of the new edition of Orwell's complete works, interviews with his family and friends, and research into unpublished material in the Orwell Archive in London, to shed new light on this most unusual literary figure. A child of the waning British Empire, Orwell came to reject the stifling class system of his birth, and through his writing forged a new social consciousness that continues to engage modern intellectual thought. Meyers' work also reveals the human failings of this creative visionary--his childhood insecurities, his political dilemmas, and his conflicted relationships with women. The Orwell who emerges from this book is a darker--but distinctly more nuanced--portrait of the legendary figure.--From publisher description.