Orwell's "Politics and the English Language"

In his essay “Politics and the English Language,” George Orwell discusses the deterioration of the English language. Orwell criticizes political prose writing by analyzing examples and pointing out the main causes for their failure- dying metaphors, verbal false limbs, pretentious diction, and meaningless words.

Despite his criticism of political prose Orwell demonstrates persuasion tactics often found in paratactic sentence structures, for example, his use of repetition in words and rhythm:

Defenseless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers. People are imprisoned for years without trial, or shot in the back of the neck or sent to die of scurvy in Arctic lumber camps: this is called elimination of unreliable elements.

Another pattern Orwell demonstrates in his construction of sentences is the use of interrupting modifiers:

Our civilization is decadent and our language -- so the argument runs -- must inevitably share in the general collapse.

In addition to pointing out where English prose are unsuccessful, he further proves his argument by explaining how one can improve of them. Orwell also takes the opportunity to further prove his point by following these rules within his essay.

In consideration of reversing the decline of the English language, Orwell offers a solution by listing the rules for acceptable prose writing.