Wifedom: Mrs. Orwell's Invisible Life

Anna Funder organizes Wifedom in five parts with many short chapters in each part. Choose one part of the book and discuss how the titles of the short chapters, the chapter lengths, and the shifting perspectives allow Funder to craft a comprehensive the portrait of Eileen while simultaneously conveying her larger point about the role of women in society.

Funder asserts that Eileen’s influence was instrumental to the creation of Orwell’s most famous work, 1984. In the notes at the end of the book is the full text of Eileen’s poem “End of the Century, 1984.” Compare the poem to a selection from Orwell’s 1984 and explain whether his writing after her death is still affected by her vision or her writing style.

Funder references Topp’s The Making of George Orwell and acknowledges that she is indebted to Topp’s biography for information that helped her to visualize and understand Eileen. However, Funder says both in the text proper and in her notes that she and Topp disagree on fundamental issues. Choose a selection of each biography, then compare and analyze each approach, arguing for which interpretation is more compelling and why.