George Orwell and his wife Eileen wrote Animal Farm together in bed

A discussion of Anna Funder's new book, Wifedom

And, if Funder is right, most credit for that book—its conception, its allegorical form, its insight, its character development, its structural perfection—is owed to Eileen rather than to George.

George also owes Eileen the name of that other little tome he wrote, Nineteen Eighty-Four, a title he likely took from a poem about a dystopian future Eileen had written when she was at university, before she met George. Her poem was called End of the Century, 1984.

But wait, there's more.

George Orwell was probably impotent (he thought himself so, but was never officially tested); he suffered from tuberculosis most of his adult life (died of it at age 46); he was injured during the Spanish Civil War; he had endless affairs while he was married to Eileen; he pursued with various degrees of vigour any number of other women—some of whom fought him off or avoided him, some of whom didn’t—and, according to Funder, he raped at least one women.

Oh, and he might’ve been gay. A viciously self-repressing…