Orwell's Roses

Solnit is an accomplished essayist and nonfiction writer whose work has appeared in numerous publications, including The New Yorker and Harper’s Magazine. She has received several accolades, such as a Guggenheim Fellowship and a nomination for a National Book Award. Her book River of Shadows won the National Book Critics Circle Award in 2004. Intellectually voracious and culturally curious, Solnit tackles questions about beauty and meaning in this book, Orwell’s Roses, an eclectic combination of biography, memoir, and essay.

The epigraph to the book, from Octavia Butler, reveals the impetus behind her work: “The very act of trying to look ahead to discern possibilities and offer warnings is in itself an act of hope.” This quotation is repeated within the text on page 259, in the context of her examination of 1984, a dystopian novel that is usually read simply as an ominous warning. Solnit teases out its beauty and its hopefulness rather than emphasizing its klaxon call: “A warning,” Solnit writes, “is not a prophecy” (259). Rather, a warning “assumes that we have choices and cautions us about the consequences” (259); a prophecy, on the other hand, is unavoidable.