Wifedom: Mrs. Orwell's Invisible Life

Although Richard’s arrival, the end of the war, and the writing of Animal Farm have collectively created harmony and intimacy between Eileen and Orwell, Orwell continues pursuing questionable affairs and engaging in notable absences. After they bring Richard home, Eileen is more committed to maintaining her health. However, her uterine problems intensify, and she goes with Richard to Gwen’s family house to recover. The adoption hearing takes place while she is still ill, but Orwell leaves before the hearing to see the end of the war in Europe. Eileen attends the hearing herself and successfully adopts Richard. She arranges for a hysterectomy but collapses again, which leads Georges Kopp to help her to go back north to Gwen’s family.

Eileen’s medical condition has been confirmed as an operable cancer. She writes to Orwell, making excuses for the expense of the surgery and downplaying her condition. Funder believes that Eileen diminished of the severity of the problem because of Orwell’s abusive behavior; he has already abandoned her during her illness and her simultaneous endeavors to adopt and raise a new baby. They have plans to move to Scotland, which will require massive work on her part, and Eileen argues that the surgery should allow her to do more. She urges Orwell to write rather than “living a literary life” (318), and she gives recommendations that are clearly designed to help him if she dies in surgery. She has opted for the less expensive option, ignoring the London physician’s recommendations for multiple blood transfusions. Instead, she plans to get the surgery done quickly. Notably, Kopp has not been forwarding Orwell’s mail to him. Eileen says this is because Kopp has no address for Orwell, but Funder believes that Kopp is angry at Orwell for leaving Eileen alone.

Orwell, who is now in Paris, dines with Harold Acton and meets Ernest Hemingway before traveling to Cologne. He strikes Hemingway as excessively paranoid, and Hemingway loans him a .32 pistol for protection. Back in England, Eileen writes Orwell two more letters before she dies in surgery. She focuses on Richard, on his teeth, on his doctor’s appointment, and on the future; however, she also explains that she has written her will and leaves everything to Orwell so that he may provide for Richard. She also specifies that she would prefer either Gwen or Norah—not Orwell’s sister Avril—to take care of Richard if both she and Orwell were to die.

Gwen’s daughter, Catherine, remembers that Gwen had a premonition about Eileen’s outcome. In 2021, she is still mystified as to why her mother did not insist on the London treatment for Eileen, especially given Gwen’s correct premonition about Laurence.