The Priest's Daughter. Long Live the Ficus!

Many are accustomed to viewing Orwell only through the lens of the dystopian genre, but the novels "The Priest's Daughter" and "Long Live the Ficus!" will introduce you to another Orwell, a master of psychological realism. Both novels are socially... critical, about loners who do not fit into society. "The Priest's Daughter." England, the era of the Great Depression. Dorothy is the daughter of the Reverend Charles Hare, the rector of St. Athelstan's Church in Suffolk. She is a skilled housekeeper, performs good deeds, tries to cultivate only good thoughts in herself, and when bad ones arise, she pricks her hand with a pin. Even when she diligently sews costumes for the school play, she is haunted by thoughts of the poverty that surrounds her and of the debts she cannot afford to pay. And suddenly she finds herself in London. She is wearing silk stockings, has money in her pocket, and cannot remember her name... This is a novel about a girl who lost her memory due to an accident, as she reexamines questions of faith and identity in a world of unemployment and hunger. Gordon Comstock is the main character of the novel "Long Live the Ficus!" He left a good job, moved to a bookstore where he earns half of his previous salary. After all, he hates consumer society, material values, and the vulgarity of everyday life embodied by the ficus in the window. In his reaction to the monstrous system, he himself becomes a sort of monster. Comstock undergoes a journey to understand that salvation can be found not in escaping from life, but in confronting it.