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Wifedom: Mrs. Orwell's Invisible Life Audiobook
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Publisher Description
This is the story of the marriage behind some of the most famous literary works of the 20th century —and a probing consideration of what it means to be a wife and a writer in the modern world
"Simply, a masterpiece...Funder not only re-makes the art of biography, she resurrects a woman in full." —Geraldine Brooks, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, author of Horse
At the end of summer 2017, Anna Funder found herself at a moment of peak overload. Family obligations and household responsibilities were crushing her soul and taking her away from her writing deadlines. She needed help, and George Orwell came to her rescue.
"I’ve always loved Orwell," Funder writes, "his self-deprecating humour, his laser vision about how power works, and who it works on." So after rereading and savoring books Orwell had written, she devoured six major biographies tracing his life and work. But then she read about his forgotten wife, and it was a revelation.
Eileen O’Shaughnessy married Orwell in 1936. O’Shaughnessy was a writer herself, and her literary brilliance not only shaped Orwell’s work, but her practical common sense saved his life. But why and how, Funder wondered, was she written out of their story? Using newly discovered letters from Eileen to her best friend, Funder re-creates the Orwells’ marriage, through the Spanish Civil War and the Second World War in London. As she peeks behind the curtain of Orwell’s private life she is led to question what it takes to be a writer—and what it is to be a wife.
A breathtakingly intimate view of one of the most important literary marriages of the twentieth century, Wifedom speaks to our present moment as much as it illuminates the past. Genre-bending and utterly original, it is an ode to the unsung work of women everywhere.
*Includes a downloadable PDF of photographs and notes from the book
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" "[Wifedom] dwells imaginatively upon six letters. . . written by Orwell’s first wife, Eileen O’Shaughnessy, and seeks to liberate her from his shadow — a task that also involves reassessing him . . . . Wifedom is radical in its outlook and distinguished by a creative writer’s imaginative insights. It is composed in elegant, mournful prose that occasionally froths into indignation at the lot of this “invisible worker” and “invisible warrior”. . . . It is a spellbinding achievement."
— Jason Harding, Financial Times "Electrifying. . . . a genre-melding hybrid that allows Eileen’s likeness to be partially recovered through her own words and the testimonies of those who remembered her, as well as reimagined in fictional passages to flesh out the gaps in the record. . . . Wifedom is a vital portrait of a woman whose unseen work was instrumental in the creation of books that became cornerstones of 20th century literature, the extent of her contribution impossible to measure, obscured as it is by the role of 'wife'.
Quotes
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“Funder does a virtuoso performance on the theme, adding personal memoir, some fictional reconstructions and a glittering sense of purpose.”
— New York Times Book Review -
“A brilliant, creative hybrid of life writing, feminist polemic and literary criticism, which upends the way we read…A dashing addition to a genre of books that bring out of obscurity the women (and occasional man) behind famous writers and artists.”
— The Guardian (Australia) -
“Simply, a masterpiece…Funder not only re-makes the art of biography, she resurrects a woman in full.”
— Geraldine Brooks, Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times bestselling author -
Funder is the perfect writer to integrate Orwell’s legacy. She, too, has devoted her writing life to the subject of surviving tyranny.
— The Conversation (Australia) -
Simply, a masterpiece. Here, Anna Funder not only re-makes the art of biography, she resurrects a woman in full. And this in a narrative that grips the reader and unfolds through some of the most consequential moments--historical and cultural--of the twentieth century.
— Geraldine Brooks, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, author of Horse -
"A marvelous book . . . I just loved it all, and have a permanently marked-up, dog-eared copy on my shelf for the next generation.
— Tom Hanks -
"Funder is a boundary-breaking, risk-taking writer whose previous books synthesized memoir, fact and imagination to impressive effect. . . . At her best, Ms. Funder shows that radical compassion—which is not the same as forgiveness—will move one closer to understanding, in marriage and biography, every time.
— Donna Rifkind, The Wall Street Journal -
"With the precision of a historian, Funder cobbles together scant details to reconstruct a life. And with the imaginative force of a novelist, she speculates in clearly sign-posted moments on what that life was like. . . .For the first time, in this book, Eileen is given a voice — her voice. . . Wifedom is spectacular achievement of both scholarship and pure feeling.
— Jessica Ferri, Los Angeles Times"A brilliant, creative hybrid of life writing, feminist polemic and literary criticism, which upends the way we read. . . . A dashing addition to a genre of books that bring out of obscurity the women (and occasional man) behind famous writers and artists. -
"Radical. . . . Funder does a virtuoso performance on the theme, adding personal memoir, some fictional reconstructions and a glittering sense of purpose. . . . [She] squeezes every drop from the sources, to make Eileen real. . . . Funder stresses that she has no wish to “cancel” Orwell, a writer she finds inspiring. Her aim is rather to rescue Eileen and other women from having been canceled themselves.
— Sarah Bakewell, The New York Times Book Review -
"Elegantly and imaginatively (resurrects) Eileen.
— The Economist "Audaciously brilliant. -
"A truly wonderful biography. . . Anna Funder has written another brilliant human portrait.
— Claire Tomalin -
Wonderful, unexpected and exciting from beginning to end.
— Antonia Fraser, author of Marie Antoinette: The Journey -
A strikingly original study that casts Orwell in new light. Deeply perceptive, it is a testament to forgotten wives of famous men everywhere.
— Julia Boyd, author of A Village in the Third Reich -
Wifedom is both an immovable and an irresistible book, an object and a force . . . another great and important narrative of oppression and covert suppression.
— Michael Hofmann, Australian Book Review -
George Orwell’s first wife emerges vividly from Anna Funder’s new book . . . welcome and necessary, returning life to a woman who was gifted, vivid, complex and highly intelligent, who gave up her own ambitions in the furtherance of her husband’s.
— Geordie Williamson, Weekend Australian
Awards
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Winner of the 2024 BookPeople Award for Nonfiction
Wifedom Listener Reviews
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2/23/2024
About Anna Funder
Anna Funder is the author of the international bestsellers, including Stasiland, which won the Samuel Johnson Prize. All That I Am won the Miles Franklin Award and was a finalist for the International IMPAC Dublin Award and the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize. It was also chosen as a BBC Book of the Week and Book at Bedtime. She was originally trained as an international human rights lawyer.