Among the texts we present here, the first three refer, each for different reasons, to forms and matters of the Interwar period, while the fourth ("The Hindrance of Literature") deals with the issue of freedom of speech and its limits within the processes of modern society, as well as the possible fate of literary genres within these limits and obstacles.

Orwell's essays are characterized by a strongly critical disposition that does not distort their subject matter, which is always approached with great sensitivity and perceptive readiness.

Thus, for example, Orwell's assessments of the Dali phenomenon, of Eliot, Miller, Lawrence, Pound, and Joyce may carry all the sharpness of criticism clearly of “political” origin, but they manage, even when they have an occasional or digressive nature, to capture, maintain, and defend the essential and the honorable.