Reviews with content warning for Sexual assault - Wifedom: Mrs Orwell's Invisible Life

Wifedom was an engagingly written but infuriating read, deliberately so. It looks at the life of Eileen O'Shaughnessy, otherwise known as the wife of George Orwell. The focus is particularly on their marriage, her contributions to his life and career, and the way he and his biographers have undervalued and erased those contributions. Funder also considers her own writing career and marriage and comments more generally on the unpaid and unrecognized labour of women. I found her arguments based on newly discovered letters from Eileen to her best friend plus informed, considered speculation to be plausible and persuasive. I was left questioning exactly what Eileen, clearly intelligent and well-educated, a go-getter with support from friends and family, saw in Orwell and why she remained with him.

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minniepauline's review against another edition

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dark emotional informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

Funder’s book is extremely well-researched, thoughtful and thought-provoking. She cares deeply about her subject and it comes through on every page. She writes with the beauty of a novelist, or maybe a poet. But what she has surmised (which is set apart from the rest of the text) fits well with the evidence, as well making me cry in various places. I would love to see this book make the Women’s Prize shortlist. And thank you to the Women’s Prize for putting it on your first even nonfiction longlist, which is how it fell into my hands.

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esmem's review against another edition

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challenging emotional informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

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larafrances's review against another edition

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challenging dark informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

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samfictiondistilling's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.75

Beautifully written and so informative. I will be forever grateful to Anna Funder for the work that went into this book and for the story of the other side of Orwell.

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schopflin's review against another edition

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medium-paced

5.0

I absolutely loved this. It's in what seems to be a new type of writing where the very essence of telling stories is examined. It's beautifully done and I feel I am familiar with Funder's version of Eileen while also accepting that other versions might exist.

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rhi_'s review against another edition

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dark reflective sad slow-paced

2.0

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