Thanks Joe - i checked that one out - its available online. Its odd what Mike said about Orwell being such an oddball.

I can remember being repulsed by his candour when I was younger. Not just brutal facts, but downright embarrassing facts. Years and years too late - I can remember stumbling upon the truth about myself that I had no great taste for truth telling and brutal honesty. And for that reason, I had wasted much of my life trying to be a writer.

Its those candid revelations - like the

' a remark which I felt to be contemptible, but which I perfectly well understood.'

which make the hairs of your neck stand up - this is a guy who WAS there, and is telling the absolute truth as he saw it and felt it.