George Bowling S Failure To En Essay

, Research Paper

Throughout life people make time to do “everything except for the things worth doing” (93). George Bowling in George Orwell’s Coming Up for Air realizes he must spend more of his life doing what he enjoys, but his wife, Hilda, prevents him from ever getting enough “air.” George needs escape from the worries and responsibilities of his life to relax and enjoy himself. Hilda is always complaining about monetary concerns which causes George to work hard to be successful. He cannot find the peace he needs, even when he eventually goes on vacation seeking fresh “air.” His vacation is cut short when he becomes paranoid that Hilda may discover where he is. George exhibits his weakness by living in a capitalistic society and folding to the pressure it places on him. The enjoyment of life he strives for is never found.

In George Bowling s society, people generally choose a lifestyle that does not permit relation, fulfillment, and enjoyment of life. George Bowling lives with his wife and two children in a suburb of London. It is an average, middle class suburb, but the people living there are working class. The townspeople must be competitive with their respective trades in order to make a living; their jobs are not secure. The people living on George s street, Ellesmere Road, are constantly preoccupied with material possessions and maintaining their jobs. These people live in a society where there is little time to think about anything but monetary matters. In this type of lifestyle, material things in their lives are necessary for their survival, and they must therefore be concerned with those things first. George states it perfectly when he says, “Nothing s real in Ellesmere Road except gas-bills, school-fees, boiled cabbage and the office on Monday” (277). Even on weekends, people are concerned work waiting at the office for them on Monday. There never is a break in this life. The material things engulf these peoples lives, and they do not ever get a chance to break free for some “air” and relaxation. These people s lives are a constant struggle. “And what are the realities of modern life. Well, the chief one is an everlasting, frantic struggle to sell things. With most people it takes the form of selling themselves- that s to say, getting a job and keeping it…That feeling that you ve got to be everlastingly fighting and hustling, that you ll never get anything unless you grab it from somebody else, that there s always somebody after your job” (150). These people are consumed by the work they must do in order to be successful so they can support a family. Sadly, these suburbanites are consumed by this capitalistic monster, and do not even realize they are leading false lives, “selling themselves,” not enjoying themselves. Everyone in the community lives the same lifestyle and no one recognizes the misfortune of ones life. These businessmen assume they should follow the suburban struggle to keep up.

George lives his life on this same path, but he comes to a understanding about his life. George explains, “The thing that really changed me, really made an impression on me, wasn t so much the books I read as the rotten meaninglessness of the life I was leading” (143). He recognizes that he lives his life with no true purpose. He goes to work and competes in order to earn money for his wife and children, and to keep up with the bills. He does not really even love his wife. George speaks about his marriage, “If you re married, there ll have been times when you ve said to yourself “Why the hell did I do it.” and God knows I ve said it often enough about Hilda, and once again, looking at it across fifteen years, why did I marry Hilda. Partly, of course, because she was young and in a way very pretty” (155-56). George does care for his children, but he really sees no goal in his life, no enjoyment in his life. He lives only to provide for his family. He is one of the few people on Ellesmere Road that realize he needs to come up for “air.” George craves some meaning enjoyment in his life:

I wondered why it is that we re all such bloody fools. Why don t people, instead of the idiocies they do spend their time on, just walk round looking at things. That pool, for instance-all the stuff that s in it. Newts, water-snails, water-beetles, caddis-flies, leeches, and God knows how many other things that you can only see with a microscope…And all the while the sort of feeling of wonder, the peculiar flame inside you. It s the only thing in the world worth having, and we don t want it. But I do want it” (194).

George knows his friends and neighbors do not want the only thing worth living for, the “flame” inside of our hearts. He has come to the realization that it is the only real thing in the world that is important and he wants to let this flame burn inside of him, but he can never find the chance to get away from his work and material life. This instant marks the first time George questions the meaning of his life and becomes more observant to what really does matter in life. The “flame” he seeks is a burning passion in his life; an intensity about certain things he does not possess.

With this realization, George finds the inspiration to get some “air” and enjoy himself. George drives in his car and stops along the side of the road to pick flowers. He is moved by what he sees: “What I felt was something so unusual nowadays that to say it soun