George Orwell begins blogging tomorrow. . .

. . .and will continue blogging for the next four years.

"The entries' four-year span covers the descent of Europe into the Second World War and Orwell's travels in Morocco following the injuries he sustained fighting in the Spanish Civil War."

The blog, established by the people who oversee the Orwell Prize, in association with the Media Standards Trust, the Orwell Trust and Political Quarterly, will appear here.

The Orwell Prize is actually two annual prizes: one's a book prize, and the other is a journalism prize. Visitors to this here web lodge may be familiar with such Orwell book prize winners as Michael Ignatieff, Francis Wheen and Michael Collins, and the journalism prize winners Timothy Garton-Ash, David Aaronovitch, and this year's winner, Johann Hari.

The (almost) complete works of George Orwell are now on-line, here.

UPDATE: I see Max Fawcett has ventured bravely into a "What Would George Say?" sort of speculation, a very risky enterprise, although I can't see all that much to disagree with except for 1) A rather rash assumption that Orwell would have anything less than contempt for the likes of Robert Fisk 2) a dubious characterization of Orwell's colonial service as merely a "rite of passage" common among young men of his generation (Orwell was born in Motihari, after all), and 3) a misreading of Paul Berman's Terror and Liberalism, owing to a failure to distinguish between Berman on Islam, and Berman on Islamism. Still, good for Max.