George Orwell (1903–1950), born Eric Arthur Blair in Motihari, British India, was an English novelist, essayist, journalist, and critic best known for Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four. Educated in England at Eton College, he later served in the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, an experience that helped shape his opposition to imperialism and authoritarian power. His political outlook was further transformed by fighting against Franco’s forces in the Spanish Civil War, where he was shot through the throat and witnessed political repression within the Republican movement. A democratic socialist and fierce critic of totalitarianism, Orwell spent his career examining propaganda, censorship, class, and the manipulation of truth before dying of tuberculosis in 1950 at age 46.