Secret Histories: Finding George Orwell in a Burmese Teashop - Couverture rigide

Burma, where George Orwell worked as an official in the Imperial police force, is currently ruled by one of the oldest and most brutal military dictatorships in the world. Around the country posters promise to 'crush all internal and external destructive elements as the common enemy', and a vast network of military intelligence ensures no one says or does anything to threaten the regime. In short, George Orwell's 'Big Brother' is alive and well in Burma.

Over the course of a year, Emma Larkin visited the places where Orwell lived, to meet the people who live there today. Starting in the former royal city of Mandalay, she travelled through the moody delta regions on the edge of the Bay of Bengal, to the mildewed splendour of the old port town Moulmein, and ending her journey in the mountains of the far north, in the forgotten town Orwell used as the setting for Burmese Days. The book journeys into the Orwellian land Burma's ruling generals have created, a place in which reality is distorted by censorship and truth is a dangerous commodity.

Secret Histories uncovers the reality of life inside this secretive, totalitarian state. Emma Larkin presents a side to the country that the military government does not want revealed: a hidden world that can be found only in whispered conversations, covered books and the potent rumours wafting like vapours through the country's teashops.

'Engaging ... [a] superb account of life in Burma's exotic tragi-comedy' (Observer 20040808)

'What shines out is the resilient, subversive humour of the people whom she meets' (Financial Times 20040814)

'[A] sympathetically zealous account of investigative travel ... Larkin traces the Orwellian parallels with admirable assiduity and nicely controlled indignation' (Sunday Telegraph 20040815)

'Emma Larkin knows her history' (Independent 20040909)

'The only Western writer who speaks proper Burmese, knows Burma... well, and has been able to record their feelings.' (Times Literary Supplement 20040917)

'An elegant travelogue through Burma, using Orwell's sojourn and experiences there as a template' (Spectator 20041127)

'Never less than fascinating.' (Sunday Times 20040822)

'An evocative account of a tropical paradise ruled by a despotic regime.' (The Times 20040822)

'Emma Larkin's book hums with such evocative sentences; they concentrate our minds about Burma.' (Literary Review 20040822)

'The result is not only an exploration of one of the twentieth century's most important writers, but an expose of one of its greatest political tragedies.' Denise Heywood (Traveller 20050301)