Orwell on the English Language.

George Orwell's famous essay "Politics and the English Language" is available all over the Internet.  It is a good essay and one I refer to all the time but not one I could inflict on our students. 

There is another essay Orwell wrote, The English People, which is not so easily found on the net which contains an essay on The English language which is more useful for English Teachers and Students.  I have a hard copy it of in my four volume Penguin paperback edition of the Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell.  In the essay The English People, Orwell devoted a section to the English Language. in which he talks about its characteristics.

The English Language, said Orwell, has two major characteristics: a large vocabulary and an easy grammar.  The vocabulary is larger than it appears because we can readily turn one part of speech into another.  For example, elbow, the body part, is also elbow the verb (two minutes for elbowing).  Many Chinese students may not believe that English has a simple grammar because Chinese has a simpler grammar than English.  But some Chinese students I have met who have studied German for instance readily admit the truth of what Orwell said.

Orwell also said in The English People that writing or speaking English is an art not a science.  I often correct students English not necessarily because what they say is misunderstandable but because it sounds ugly.  Chinglish is bad not always because it is misunderstood; it is really bad because it is ugly like the work of a four year old given crayons.  The problem of style is something that native English Speakers have to wrestle with all the time.  So I tell my Chinese students to not despair. 

If only I could get them to use their imaginations and stop them from memorizing things, they would have a more enjoyable time learning English and I would have a more enjoyable time teaching them.