Penguin Books-Martin Secker & Warburg Ltd

A NOTE ON THE TEXT Keep the Aspidistra Flying was published by Gollancz on 20 April 1936. Three thousand copics were run off, of which 2,194 were sold; most of the remainder were lost as the result of an air-raid. It was not published again in Orwell's lifetime, only appearing in Seeker ...

The decision to write this book was made for me when I wrote the last sentences of my accoimt of the battle of Culloden and its aftermath in the Scottish Highlands. I quote them here as an introduction and an explanation: 'Once the chiefs lost their powers many of them lost also any parental...