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Burmese Days
54
Burmese Days
George Orwell
Literary Devices
- Foreshadowing
- Imagery
- Synesthesia
- Tension/conflict
- Plot
- Allusion
Characters
Who are they and how are they described?
- U Po Kyin
- Ma Kin
- Dr. Veraswami
- Flory
- Flo
- Mr. & Mrs. Lackersteen
- Ellis
- Westfield
- McGreggor
- Maxwell
- Elizabeth
- Ko S'la
- Ma Hla May
- Verrall
Setting & Situation
- Where is the novel set?
- How is the setting described?
- What is the atmosphere?
Author/Speaker
- Does the author influence your understanding of the text?
- Who is the narrator?
- What does the narrator tell us?
- How does the narrator tell us?
George Orwell
Burmese Days (1934)
The novel focuses on a single fictional colony in Burma: Kyauktada. Both the colonizers and the colonized in the novel are aware of the waning “glory” of the British Raj. The novel begins with the British instituting a last-ditch effort to maintain their authority by admitting a select few of the colonized who serve the empire in various public offices as members of the European club. Many of the colonizers (such as Ellis and Mr. Lackersteen) are resistant to such an offensive break in colonial tradition. The novel’s protagonist, Flory, should oppose the latter opinion, given his close friendship with the Indian Dr. Veraswami, but Flory is reluctant to is too apprehensive to oppose the empire outright.
Orwell was born in Motihari, India, and as an adult served the British Empire for five years as a police officer throughout Burma, in such colonies as Maymyo and Rangoon (Aung, "George Orwell and Burma”). Orwell’s first-hand experience with empire in this way grants potency to his critique, along with a sense of realism and credibility that drives subtext of Burmese Days.