Burmese Days

by George Orwell

Burmese Days: Genre 1 key example

Chapter 24
Explanation and Analysis:

Burmese Days is a prime example of colonial literature. Orwell's staunch anti-imperialist stance stands out amongs contemporaneous British literature—especially standing out amongst books written by White British men in the 1930s. Burmese Days foregrounds classic late Modernist disillusionment against a backdrop of colonial oppression and racism. The novel is first and foremost a tragedy, exploring the ways in which colonizers lose their own humanity in the act of dehumanizing colonized peoples.