Editing George Orwell (section)

===Social interactions===
Orwell was noted for very close and enduring friendships with a few friends, but these were generally people with a similar background or with a similar level of literary ability. Ungregarious, he was out of place in a crowd and his discomfort was exacerbated when he was outside his own class. Though representing himself as a spokesman for the common man, he often appeared out of place with real working people. His brother-in-law Humphrey Dakin, a [[Hail fellow well met|"Hail fellow, well met"]] type, who took him to a local pub in Leeds, said that he was told by the landlord: "Don't bring that bugger in here again."<ref>Ian Angus Interview 23–25 April 1965 quoted in Stansky and Abrahams ''The Unknown George Orwell''</ref> Adrian Fierz commented "He wasn't interested in racing or greyhounds or pub crawling or [[shove ha'penny]]. He just did not have much in common with people who did not share his intellectual interests."<ref>Adrian Fierz in Stephen Wadhams ''Remembering Orwell''</ref> Awkwardness attended many of his encounters with working-class representatives, as with Pollitt and McNair,<ref>John McNair ''George Orwell: The Man I knew'' MA Thesis – Newcastle University Library 1965, quoted Crick (1982), p. 317</ref> but his courtesy and good manners were often commented on. [[Jack Common]] observed on meeting him for the first time, "Right away manners, and more than manners—breeding—showed through."<ref>Jack Common Collection Newcastle University Library quoted in Crick (1982), p. 204</ref>

In his tramping days, he did domestic work for a time. His extreme politeness was recalled by a member of the family he worked for; she declared that the family referred to him as "[[Stan Laurel|Laurel]]" after the film comedian.<ref name="autogenerated1996"/> With his gangling figure and awkwardness, Orwell's friends often saw him as a figure of fun. [[Geoffrey Gorer]] commented "He was awfully likely to knock things off tables, trip over things. I mean, he was a gangling, physically badly co-ordinated young man. I think his feeling [was] that even the inanimate world was against him."<ref>Geoffrey Gorer&nbsp;– recorded for Melvyn Bragg BBC Omnibus production ''The Road to the Left'' 1970</ref> At the BBC in the 1940s, "everybody would pull his leg"<ref name =Wilshin>Sunday Wilshin in Stephen Wadhams ''Remembering Orwell'' Penguin Books 1984</ref> and Spender described him as having real entertainment value "like, as I say, watching a Charlie Chaplin movie".<ref>Stephen Spender in Stephen Wadhams ''Remembering Orwell'' Penguin Books 1984</ref> A friend of Eileen's reminisced about her tolerance and humour, often at Orwell's expense.<ref name=Donahue/>

One biography of Orwell accused him of having had an authoritarian streak.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9780805076936-1 |title=Powell's Books&nbsp;– Synopses and Reviews of D J Taylor ''Orwell: The Life'' |publisher=Powells.com |date=12 October 2010 |access-date=21 October 2010}}</ref> One of his former pupils recalled [[school corporal punishment|being beaten]] so hard he could not sit down for a week.<ref>Interview with Geoffrey Stevens, Crick (1982), pp. 222–223</ref> When sharing a flat with Orwell, Heppenstall came home late one night in an advanced stage of loud inebriation. The upshot was that Heppenstall ended up with a bloody nose and was locked in a room. When he complained, Orwell hit him across the legs with a [[shooting stick]] and Heppenstall then had to defend himself with a chair. Years later, after Orwell's death, Heppenstall wrote a dramatic account of the incident called "The Shooting Stick".<ref>Heppenstall ''The Shooting Stick'' Twentieth Century April 1955</ref>

Orwell got on well with young people. The pupil he beat considered him the best of teachers and the young recruits in Barcelona tried to drink him under the table without success.<ref name= Dakin/>

In the wake of his most famous works, he attracted many uncritical hangers-on, but many others who sought him found him aloof and even dull. With his soft voice, he was sometimes shouted down or excluded from discussions.<ref>Michael Meyer ''Not Prince Hamlet: Literary and Theatrical Memoirs'' Secker and Warburg 1989</ref> At this time, he was severely ill; it was wartime or the austerity period after it; during the war his wife suffered from depression; and after her death he was lonely and unhappy. In addition to that, he always lived frugally and seemed unable to care for himself properly. As a result of all this, people found his circumstances bleak.<ref>T. R. Fyval ''George Orwell: A Personal Memoir'' 1982</ref> Some, like [[Michael Ayrton]], called him "Gloomy George", but others developed the idea that he was an "English [[secular saint]]".<ref>{{cite news|first=Robert |last=McCrum |author-link=Robert McCrum |title=George Orwell was no fan of the News of the World |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2011/jul/14/george-orwell-news-world |work=[[The Guardian]] |date=14 July 2011|access-date=7 May 2018}}</ref>