How Orwell’s retreat to a remote Scottish island shaped his final book, an allegory of things to come.

At 43, Eric Arthur Blair felt exhausted, and not just because of the war, which had just ended. Though, to him, the actual war had just started in 1936 in Spain.

It affected the world. It affected him personally. On May 20, 1937, he was shot through the throat by a Francoist snipper, which affected his voice ever since.

The shot didn’t change his literary voice, however. If anything, it refined it, making it simpler and more direct. So effective in the transparency of his carefully unembellished English.

“It was at the corner of the parapet, at five o’clock in the morning. This was always a dangerous time, because we had the dawn at our backs, and if you stuck your head above the parapet it was clearly outlined against the sky. I was talking to the sentries preparatory to changing the guard. Suddenly, in the very middle of saying something, I felt – it is very hard to describe what I felt, though I remember it with the utmost vividness.“

Homage to Catalonia (1938), Chapter 10 (p. 187 in the Penguin Modern Classics edition), George Orwell

Despite the relative success of his press articles and previous books, especially the nonfiction works such as the serious Homage to Catalonia (1938), none of them resonated as much as the recently published Animal Farm (1945).

“The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.”

Animal Farm, Chapter 10, page 141 (Penguin Classics edition)

The things Orwell learned in Catalonia

Written like a fable, it elevated his literary name, George Orwell, in Britain and abroad at a time of peace and reconstruction, but also of navigating the role of one of the winners, the Soviet Union, George Orwell was now a reference in the West.

The war was over, and there was no chance to return to any sort of innocence, as French writer Albert Camus wrote in the French Resistance daily newspaper Combat on August 8, 1945 (English version).

After the horror of the Holocaust and the nuclear bombs dropped in Japan, the world opened a new chapter, and nothing would be the same.

The Yalta Conference of February 1945 had just prepared the post-war reorganization like a game of risk with Joseph Stalin: 34 years had passed since the Soviet leader had starved as a bum, then known as Ioseb Jughashvili, in the streets of Vienna, writing pamphlets just to get by and prepare for the Revolution. The opportunity would arrive in his home country in 1917.

At that same time, other Vienna bums were frequenting the same cafés and literary-revolutionary circles: an amateur painter and loner lacking any talent, the German-nationalism-obsessed Adolf Hitler; a communist revolutionary working in factories, Josip Broz Tito, the future leader of the Yugoslav Partisans; or the admirer of another revolutionary living in the city back then and future antagonist of Stalin: Leon Trotsky. There were many others.

Twenty years later, the world had changed and was well on its way to World War II. Hitler, the Vienna bum, was about to reshape Europe and the world. After the war, Europe was about to become a satellite of external forces. It wouldn’t lead anymore.

In places like Catalonia, George Orwell had come to know first-hand how Stalinism had exterminated dissent and chased internationalists like Trotsky supporters across the world, and now he was poised to claim Eastern Europe as a compensatory war bounty.

Knowing when it’s time to retire from the chit-chat

Yet Eric Blair, a renowned journalist who remained an uncomfortable figure due to his independence and critiques across the board (especially for accommodating left-wing and right-wing career politicians, who showed their submission to their promoters after the war and not to their convictions), realized that it wasn’t time to waste his energy by commenting on politics on the daily press in post-war London, which attracted people and investors as many things needed to be rebuilt.

Orwell’s distrust and critique of totalitarianism were perceived as provocative and divisive among leftist circles in the West, which wrote uncritically about Stalin and the USSR and treated any independent thinker such as Camus or Orwell as sellouts (history would vindicate their guts soon enough). On the right, Blair was simply an agitator, an anti-imperialist since his Burmese Days (1934), so jealous of his independence that he couldn’t be “trusted” (read “controlled”).

Punched from all sides, he was the equivalent of Camus across the Channel, though he wasn’t a man of posturing. Plus, Blair had engaged in the Spanish Civil War not only as a journalist but also as a member of the Trotskyist militia assembled by the POUM, a local party that the Stalinists relentlessly sabotaged to extirpate decentralized libertarianism from leftist workers in industrial areas like Barcelona. He knew things firsthand. He had participated in them.

George Orwell had seen too much and didn’t want to be one more cynic in London pandering to the establishment. So, instead of claiming Clement Attlee’s Labour Party victory in 1945 as his own, he decided to look for a place to seek introspection and write what was brewing: a timeless reflection on the risks of totalitarianism of all sorts. Orwell wasn’t keeping pace with the people claiming victory, and, like Thoreau one century before, he was hearing a different drummer.

That’s how George Orwell withdrew from the noise of post-war London politics, as it was clear that Western Europe would become a satellite of the US and something would need to be done to speed the continent: the best way to prevent further expansion of the Soviet Union would arrive on June 5, 1947, through the European Recovery Program (ERP), popularly named after the US Secretary of State then, George C. Marshall.

While Europe was being divided between Americans and the Soviets, both superpowers were already interested in the former European colonies across Asia and beyond. But, instead of spending his time writing about this and other things just like any other journalist selling their pen to whomever they could or suited them, George Orwell decided to go against the trend when he moved to Jura, a remote island in the Inner Hebrides of Scotland (population when Blair moved there: a little over 250 permanent residents; population now: 196 people). There were several waves of emigration from the place due to hunger and growing rents.

Life in Barnhill, farm in the remote Inner Hebrides

George Orwell and Albert Camus never met in person but admired each other’s work and views on totalitarianism, political independence, and moral responsibility when societies most needed such traits: once institutions were being weakened and people were afraid to speak or even seek the truth.

Orwell suffered from tuberculosis and sensed that he wouldn’t live a long life; plus, a book was brewing in him, and an important one, for that matter. Menaced by the advance of his health, Orwell read Camus’s The Plague one year after his publication in 1947 and was impressed by it. The same year, Camus wrote Orwell a letter expressing his appreciation for Animal Farm; they wanted to meet each other and perhaps planned to do so once Orwell returned from his retreat.

That Orwell, who suffered from tuberculosis and was hence affected by damp conditions and lack of access to health care, went to an island in the least populated area of sparsely populated Scotland says something about his character and priorities. The writer’s primary drive was his desire for solitude and focus, and he concentrated on writing what would become 1984.

Jura wasn’t an easy place in the Mediterranean. Instead, the place is rainy, rugged, and demanding, with limited amenities, and it is difficult to get groceries and the mail regularly. It remains so today. The island, raided and settled by the Norse like other Inner Hebrides, is distinguished from the sea due to three bare, conical quartzite mountains that reach 785 meters (over 2,500 feet). Due to their shape, they are called the Paps of Jura (“pap” being a breast-shaped hill).

Orwell lived in Barnhill, a remote farmhouse on the island’s northern end 25 miles from Craighouse (population of around 100, out of 200 in the whole island), the nearest village.

It was a simple, barely furnished house lacking electricity or running water, as off-grid as one could be in Great Britain at the time. On cold days he mainly used the basic kitchen, the sitting room where the fireplace was located, and one of the bedrooms. On grey, cold days he wrote in the sitting room, going outdoors when the weather permitted.

An island within an island within an island

It was a Spartan life, an opportunity to confront the essential demands and questions of existence, especially after a period that had generated so much despair and nihilism among the least simplistic people. On any given day, he would write first time in the morning and late in the evening.

He also took care of the essential household chores; relying on self-sufficiency, Orwell and anyone invited needed to chop wood and keep it dry for heating, fetch water from a nearby stream, and grow vegetables in a small garden; Orwell’s little farm was completed with a few animals: chickens and goats supplemented his diet with eggs, fresh milk and the unusual meat feast.

Supplies were limited even in the nearest town, and fresh food was scarce. Orwell’s health deteriorated, though he prioritized the work. Having visitors seemed to reinvigorate him and connect him with a world that made sense to him, one of community and proximity: besides his son, Richard Blair, the writer also hosted his sister, Avril Blair, and a local housekeeper. Friends Richard Rees and Paul Potts visited often and encouraged him to carry on with the novel.

Two winters went on, and the novel was completed in 1948. Orwell sent the final typescript to his publishers on December 4, 1948. The book came out on June 8, 1949.

However, Blair’s health declined, and his sister and friends convinced him to leave the remote island to seek treatment in 1949 at a sanatorium in Gloucestershire. He died in January 1950, shortly after the publication of 1984.

When the Scottish islands give a second opportunity in life

One can wonder whether the novel would have had a different tone if Eric Blair had chosen a different remote, off-grid place to settle in. Most likely, the damp climate and the stress—physical and psychological—made his recovery unlikely. When he was finally transferred to London’s University College Hospital, a new treatment available, the antibiotic streptomycin, couldn’t make a difference. It seems the writer prioritized a book over his own health.

Things could have been much different today. The story of Eric Arthur Blair writing 1984 near the fireplace in Barnhill came to mind in a recent article about the inspiring repopulation of a nearby tiny island of Ulva.

Ulva is only about 50 miles to the north of the area where Barnhill sits on the bigger island of Jura, but it takes over six hours to reach it; to do so, one has to leave Jura for the Scottish mainland and drive north on A816 to the town of Ovan, then take a ferry to the isle of Muli, and from there another one to the destination in Ulva.

Ken Ilgunas writes about how the place, with its natural Hebrides beauty, lost the population it had held for millennia and how a few back-to-the-landers and bringing it back to life, rebuilding old stone houses, planting gardens and caring for their little farms once again:

“In 2025, the idea of settling anyplace other than Mars might seem anachronistic, but the people on Ulva are pioneers of a different kind. They are giving new life to places left behind by the industrial and agricultural revolutions, imagining a 21st-century settlement built not on extraction but on connection — to nature, vegetable gardens, art, community and a life away from screens.”

Walden on Wheels

To some, the proposal to settle in Ulva seems irresistible. The idea came to be when, in 2017, the current owner, Jamie Howard, who descends from the family that owned the place for generations, put it for sale, and a community group from the neighboring Isle of Mill bought it for £4.5 million ($6 million) with the idea to repopulate the island.

“In a little over six years, the islanders’ homes have been renovated with double-glazed windows and heat pumps. The pier has been upgraded, the old hunting lodge transformed into a busy hostel, and the population has more than tripled, rising from five to 16 — still tiny, but a significant move in the right direction in a place where the trend is usually one toward loss.”

It shouldn’t surprise anybody Ken Ilgunas, a writer like Blair and author of “Walden on Wheels,” is interested in the rebirth of Ulva. But, in the experiment, he also sees a blueprint that could be emulated in many places across Europe and North America.

Many beautiful areas that got depopulated in the past could offer many of the things that contemporary society seems to be failing to offer to most: an affordable place to live, a connection with nature, an opportunity to find meaning by helping restore places that lost their way, and a sense of purpose and community around common goals.

The case of Ulva isn’t extraordinary in the context of the Scottish Hebrides. Inhabited since prehistory, the agrarian population peaked in the early 1800s, as people left for industrial centers like Glasgow and Northern England or migrated to North America, Australia, or the African colonies.

In the mid-to-late nineteenth century, as demand for kelp (algae) to manufacture soap and glass collapsed, the Hebrides fell into the hands of big landowners raising sheep, and only a few families stayed in the smallest islands. This could change now—as communities create trusts to take over places like Ulva. Ken Ilgunas’s article as the place, which dealt with Norse incursions in the early Middle Ages, comes back to life:

“Critics might argue that experiments such as Ulva’s are too small and too remote to be replicated in the United States. But in an age where we’ve grown used to tackling issues with sweeping infrastructure bills and large-scale projects, there’s something refreshing — and also quintessentially American — about small-scale, community-led development.”

Starting over again in a tiny Greek island

Those suffering from poor health, like George Orwell, wouldn’t have much trouble finding desolate islands in the middle of the Mediterranean with a faltering population and incentives for those wanting to settle there, restore a house, build a family, and contribute to the local community with their purpose, hopes, and skills.

The tiny Greek island of Antikythera, at the edge of the Aegean Sea midway between the southernmost tip of the Peloponnese to the north and the island of Crete to the south, has a year-round population of 39, which increases in summer.

Connected through a small ferry route that sometimes carries only one or two passengers who need to bring gasoline and other goods to their place, Antikythera is struggling for survival despite its ancient history (if its name sounds familiar, you might have heard about the discovery of the so-called oldest analog computer ever discovered, the Antikythera mechanism, which is believed to have been used to predict astronomical positions and eclipses decades in advance, hence helping with more mundane tasks such as establishing dates for the Olympic Games).

Now, the local authorities of Antikythera, in collaboration with the Greek Orthodox Church, offer financial incentives for people to move there: a monthly stipend of €500 during the first three years, free housing, and a lot of land to cultivate or build one’s own place.

They’re looking for young families, professionals, and skilled workers like bakers, fishermen, builders, and other craftspeople to build a local, self-sufficient economy and community. It sounds like an opportunity to learn many things about the Mediterranean and its ancient ways.

Getting your hands dirty amid nature is good for you

Like in the times of George Orwell in Jura, we live in convoluted moments, and it doesn’t seem to be a good investment to get sucked into the calls for the current American Administration to concentrate our attention and our personal drives to pursue our own productive time. It’s perhaps a good time to check out of the “news spiral” and focus one’s attention on the many productive things we can do near us.

The enterprise of bringing a little house and a piece of land back to life, or building one’s own from scratch, in the context of a like-minded community may be enticing enough given the current climate. It might make sense emotionally, spiritually, economically. It could also improve the health of many people who seem to be struggling to find meaning in their days.

Every day, a new study highlights how our connection with nature triggers reparative mechanisms in our organism. A recent study by the University of Exeter in collaboration with the University of Vienna states that even “watching” nature scenes can reduce pain:

“Using an fMRI scanner, researchers monitored the brain activity of 49 participants in Austria, as they received pain delivered through a series of small electric shocks. When they were watching videos of a natural scene compared to a city or an indoor office, participants not only reported feeling less pain, but scans showed the specific brain responses associated with processing pain changed too.”

It turns out we’re still wired to get our hands dirty once in a while and plant things, build things, and feel the natural surroundings. One wonders whether, instead of taking medication to avoid the contemporary struggles of our civilization (from depression to the good ol’ philosophical angst), people wouldn’t be better off kickstarting a healthier life for them and theirs, and the ability to empathize.

The biophilia hypothesis seems to vindicate its existence.

1948, 1984

When we look at nature in the eye, we’re reminded of the connection of all things. Things that sounded grave seem less frightening as we put them in perspective. Active participation in the land and surrounding communities makes us more attached to better possible futures.

“If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face—forever.”

1984, Part 3, Chapter 3, page 267 (Signet Classics edition)

When in Jura, George Orwell wrote these words to make them less plausible in the future because, by acknowledging it could happen anywhere, readers would be a bit better prepared to fight back if the moment arrived.

If we imagine Orwell in 1948 writing 1984, we see somebody secluded who is feeling responsible about his time. He still wanted to make a difference, to contribute to making his surroundings a slightly better place.

There are indications that Albert Camus tried to visit Orwell in London in 1949, but Eric Blair’s advanced tuberculosis prevented the encounter. When he died in January 1950, the French writer reportedly mourned his death. Like him, he had taken it from both the right and the left.

The world was again sure of itself and righteous, and the ones that had been afraid to call foul when societies needed it were again benefiting from a time of peace and chit-chat.

Return to Barnhill

In Jura, Barnhill has changed little since the late 1940s. A generator supplies electricity; there’s a small, gas-powered refrigerator, and a cast-iron Rayburn cooker and stove provide the heating. According to Damaris Fletcher from the Orwell Society:

“You have to bring your own supplies if you want to stay here. If you stay here, you’re really treading in Orwell’s footsteps. He would recognize the place instantly if he were to step through the door today.”

Richard Blair, Orwell’s son, has shared fond memories of the place:

“Jura was a wonderful place to be a child. But this wasn’t a holiday for us. Everything my Dad wrote and said indicates that he wanted to be here full time. For him, Jura was home.”

May we all be lucky and find “home.”