Eric Arthur Blair (25 June 1903-21 January 1950), well known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English novelist, essayist, journalist, and critic. He was born in Bengal, India and educated in England. His father was a lower British official in the Indian civil service, his mother of French ancestors, was the daughter of a futile teak merchant in Burma (Myanmar). After school he became an Imperial policeman in Burma, before departing to Suffolk, where he began his writing career as George Orwell. He managed to focus on subjects like social injustice, resistance to dictatorship and support towards elected communism. The acute honesty and intention of his essays and non-fiction made Orwell one of the leading social commentators of his age. He is known for the symbolic novel Animal Farm (1944), and the autocratic novel Nineeteen Eighy-Four (1949). His non-fiction works, including The Road to Wigan Pier (1937), recording his experience of working-class life in the industrial north of England, and Homage to Catalonia (1938), an account of his experiences repairing for the Republican faction of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) are as outstandingly respected as his essays on politics and literature, language and culture. George Orwell died in London in January 1950.