<P> "Politics and the English Language" was published nearly simultaneously with another of Orwell's essays, "The Prevention of Literature". Both reflect Orwell's concern with truth and how truth depends upon the use of language . Orwell noted the deliberate use of misleading language to hide unpleasant political and military facts and also identified a laxity of language among those he identified as pro-Soviet . In "The Prevention of Literature" he also speculated on the type of literature under a future totalitarian society which he predicted would be formulaic and low grade sensationalism . Around the same time Orwell wrote an unsigned editorial for Polemic in response to an attack from Modern Quarterly . In this he highlights the double - talk and appalling prose of J.D. Bernal in the same magazine, and cites Edmund Wilson's damnation of the prose of Joseph E. Davies in Mission to Moscow . </P> <P> In his biography of Orwell, Michael Shelden called the article "his most important essay on style", while Bernard Crick made no reference to the work at all in his original biography, reserving his praise for Orwell's essays in Polemic, which cover a similar political theme . John Rodden asserts, given that much of Orwell's work was polemical, that he sometimes violated these rules and Orwell himself concedes that if you look back through his essay, "for certain you will find that I have again and again committed the very faults I am protesting against". Rodden also says that Terry Eagleton had praised the essay's demystification of political language but had later become disenchanted with Orwell . </P> <P> Linguist Geoffrey Pullum--despite being an admirer of Orwell's writing--criticised the essay for "its insane and unfollowable insistence that good writing must avoid all phrases and word uses that are familiar". Orwell's admonition to avoid using the passive voice has also been criticised . Merriam--Webster's Dictionary of English Usage refers to three statistical studies of passive versus active sentences in various periodicals, stating: "the highest incidence of passive constructions was 13 percent . Orwell runs to a little over 20 percent in' Politics and the English Language' . Clearly he found the construction useful in spite of his advice to avoid it as much as possible". </P> <P> Introductory writing courses frequently cite this essay . A 1999 study found that it was reprinted 118 times in 325 editions of 58 readers published between 1946 and 1996 that were intended for use in college - level composition courses . </P>

Politics in the english language by george orwell