Dia Orwell: Barcelona's Homage to George Orwell
On December 26, 1936, Eric Arthur Blair, known to most as author George Orwell, stepped off the train at Estació de França in Barcelona. He would spend the next six months traveling between the regions of Catalunya and Aragon in a fight against fascism, an experience that would inspire his 1938 novel Homage to Catalonia.
The premise of the novel—the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War—spurred Orwell’s decision to move to Spain. Defining himself as a socialist, he had a vague notion of writing a piece on the events unfolding in the country. However, it was only a matter of days before he traded his pen for a weapon and joined a militia group in defense of the Second Spanish Republic against Franco and his Nationalist forces.
Orwell’s first impressions of Barcelona would stay with him. An anti-fascist stronghold for most of the war, the city had become a reflection of the complex factions of the left. United in battle against Franco, they were divided in their concept of an ideal society—those who supported the Republican government and those who idealized revolution. Upon his arrival, Barcelona was in the midst of what was essentially an anarchist revolution, a fervor which had gripped the Catalan capital at the onset of the war.
He recalls his first walk up Las Ramblas in Homage to Catalonia:
“It was the first time I had ever been in a town where the working class was in the saddle. Practically every building of any size had been seized by the workers and was draped with red flags or with the red and black flag of the Anarchists, […] every shop and café had an inscription saying that it had been collectivized.”
Within a few weeks the author would leave behind revolutionary Barcelona for the trenches in Aragon. The militia he joined, more or less by accident, was that of the POUM (the Workers’ Party of Marxist Unification), a rather small group of anti-Stalinist revolutionaries. He was sent to the front line near the towns of Zaragoza and Huesca where he spent the next few months braving the cold and miserable conditions in the name of anti-fascism.
Orwell returned to Barcelona in May 1937, by which time the city had changed considerably. Underlying tensions were coming to a head, and on May 3rd a struggle between anarchists and the Catalan police exploded into five days of vicious infighting among the leftist factions. The revolutionary experiment would come to a tragic end as the local government reclaimed total control of the city.
Having survived the street fighting, the author returned to the front, only to be shot through the neck 10 days later by a Francoist sniper—the bullet just missed his carotid artery. Although a lucky escape, it took Orwell weeks of recuperation before he could return to Barcelona. This would be his last time in the city, and once again he narrowly escaped with his life.
Blamed for the infighting in May, the POUM was declared an illegal organization. Now a fugitive in the city, and after weeks of hiding, Orwell finally fled back to England.
Once home, he began to write a raw and honest personal account of his observations and experiences of the Spanish Civil War, which would become Homage to Catalonia. Not just a wartime journal, the book addresses the lies, manipulation and political tyranny from both the right and the left that he witnessed, no doubt laying the groundwork for his most celebrated work, 1984 (1949).
Orwell Day Events
Every year the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona (CCCB) commemorates George Orwell and his passion for overcoming social injustice. This year from June 6th to 8th the celebrations address the rise of the far right with an expert on populism, Cas Mudde, the dangers of an Internet controlled by big corporations with Geert Lovink, director of the Institute of Network Cultures, and the memorization of the Spanish Civil War with the historians Aitor Garcia Solé and Queralt Solé Barjau, the researcher Marta Marín-Dòmine, professor Miquel Berga, and the actresses Paula Vicente Mascó and Berta Cascante.
Events include free tours led by local historians retracing Orwell's steps in Barcelona. These routes through Orwell’s Barcelona offer a different perspective on the Barcelona we live in today (registration required).
For more tours about Orwell and the Spanish Civil War throughout the year see:
Nick Lloyd's Spanish Civil War Tour
This article was published June 1, 2017, updated May 28, 2023.