George Orwell in the Spanish Civil War

George Orwell is one of the most influential authors of the modern era, and his book 'Homage to Catalonia' details his experiences during the conflict. This video examines his activities during the war in closer detail, utilising various sources to give more insight on why Orwell went to Spain, his thoughts on the war and his experiences and his view in hindsight upon leaving Spain.
Sources:
George Orwell - Homage to Catalonia
George Orwell - Why I Write
George Orwell - Looking Back on the Spanish Civil War
Michael Shelden - Orwell : The Authorized Biography
Bernard Crick - George Orwell : A Life
Antony Beevor - The Battle for Spain : The Spanish Civil War 1936 - 1939
Footage from Ken Loach's 1995 film "Land and Freedom" was also used in this video.

[@alanbryce1821]

Such dynamic commentary!

[@kieronheath4813]

Really enjoyed the video - many thanks indeed

[@HealthyThinkingsubstack]

Living in Barcelona since 2013, and then visiting again last month, reinforced my perception of the failure of Barcelonian socialism. The people there are very arrogant. They have a horrific sense of entitlement to anything free and generally speaking they are lazy and uncreative. They protest for more free time and they do nothing with that free time to better themselves or their community. The banks are atrocious and will outright steal your money, regardless of your rights that money and amount of documentation. The socialism of Barcelona has made me antisocialist, even though I was probably a socialist for most of my life. Liberals tend to be unorganized and undisciplined and this this tends to make them ineffective. So their ideas tend to be short-lived, begging the question about the value of those ideas if they cannot be actualized and maintained. Now in 2024 citizens of Barcelona are actively protesting against their own tourism industry, which again speaks to their arrogance and entitlement because they don’t really have any other major source of income other than tourism basically strangling their own economy, but they feel entitled to do so. my perception of socialism and the extent to which it can be attributed to Marx is that it has no goal other than freedom for no purpose. People want more free time and they want more money and they want to be part owners of the businesses, but they have no idea how to run a business they have no goal of doing anything with the money once they have it and they have no idea of actually improving their societies or themselves.