This week we’re discussing the first half of Burmese Days by George Orwell.
The first half of the novel is an evocative, semi-autobiographical account of the man John Flory, an English timber merchant living in the Burmese imperial district of Kyauktada. Flory is a sensitive and depraved fellow, a person whose life did not play out exactly as he planned. Lacking other prospects, Flory secured a job at the timber company with the help of his parents, and was sent out to Burma in his early twenties. It has been fifteen years since that moment. He has not seen England since.
He is a man with no friends and no prospects for them. The English imperial agents with their racist bravado does not appeal to him, and true friendship with the subjected Burmese is socially impossible. The closest Flory gets is with the striving Indian doctor Veraswami. The doctor is a loyal British subject, advocating for imperial virtues where Flory refuses to. Veraswami is also being targeted by the corrupt deputy U Po Kyin whom Verawswami refers to as the crocodile. Veraswami appeals to Flory for assistance in fending off U Po Kyin, but Flory’s cowardly behavior stops him from doing so.
The final chapters of this section introduce us to Elizabeth. She is the orphaned daughter of an overly optimistic businessman and a faux artist mother, coming to Kyauktada to live with her aunt and Uncle - Mr and Mrs. Lackersteen, two frequenters to the English Club. Flory falls for her almost immediately and hopes that she will be the friend and companion that he had been hoping for, but Elizabeth is perhaps more imperial than any of the other British subjects in Burma. Flory tries to introduce Elizabeth to different aspects of Burmese life - dances, bazzaars, the natives generally, but all Elizabeth can see is a beastly people below her as contrasted to the beautiful life of luxury she aspires to.