Literature

Asimov is weirdly dismissive of Orwell's experience in the Spanish Civil War and the Anarchists who faught in it.

He also turned left wing and became a socialist, fighting with the loyalists in Spain in the 1930s. There he found himself caught up in the sectarian struggles between the various left-wing factions, and since he believed in a gentlemanly English form of socialism, he was inevitably on the losing side. Opposed to him were passionate Spanish anarchists, syndicalists, and communists, who bitterly resented the fact that the necessities of fighting the Franco fascists got in the way of their fighting each other. The communists, who were the best organised, won out and Orwell had to leave Spain, for he was convinced that if he did not, he would be killed From then on, to the end of his life, he carried on a private literary war with the communists, determined to win in words the battle he had lost in action.

The Anarchists were consistently under attack from the Communists, having to move troops from the front lines fighting Franco, to instead deal with Communist raids upon the anarchist communes, until they could be convinced to cooperate again as Franco would win some other battle against the weakened socialist front.

The communists then really did eventually go full ham into betrayal mode, declaring the Anarchists and Trotskyists secret fascists helping the enemy, and rounded them up to be imprisoned or killed.

It is no wonder why all that would deeply sour Orwell on Stalinist communism, and why he would write so fervently in warning of it.

During World War II, in which he was rejected for military service, he was associated with the left wing of the British Labour party, but didn't much sympathise with their views, for even their reckless version of socialism seemed too well organised for him. He wasn't much affected, apparently, by the Nazi brand of totalitarianism, for there was no room within him except for his private war with Stalinist communism. Consequently, when Great Britain was fighting for its life against Nazism, and the Soviet Union fought as an ally in the struggle and contributed rather more than its share in lives lost and in resolute courage, Orwell wrote Animal Farm which was a satire of the Russian Revolution and what followed, picturing it in terms of a revolt of barnyard animals against human masters. He completed Animal Farm in 1944 and had trouble finding a publisher since it wasn't a particularly good time for upsetting the Soviets. As soon as the war came to an end, however, the Soviet Union was fair game and Animal Farm was published. It was greeted with much acclaim and Orwell became sufficiently prosperous to retire and devote himself to his masterpiece, 1984.

I did not know it was finished in 1944, that is wild, no wonder it's taught in American schools.