Response to "The Two Winstons"

Watching the "Two Winstons" section of Schama's documentary, the first significant idea that grabs my attention is that of the Chinese opium "habit." I use quotes here only to emphasize that "habit" may not exactly be the correct word; by using this word, and failing to elaborate, the documentary puts a more-than-deserved negative slant on the Chinese, failing to mentioned that it was the British and Indian governments that instigated the Chinese addiction to opium in the first place. Once opium was officially outlawed in China, and many Chinese were already addicted, Britain and India continued to sneak it in, which was infuriating, as the Chinese government (and many commoners) found opium use to be immoral and unhealthy, an alarming trend that needed to be eradicated. However, the illegal British/Indian triangular trade with China—in which the British could avoid coming into contact with the Chinese at all by using Indian ships to do their "dirty work"—continued for years, and this lead to the Opium Wars. See John Fairbank and Merle Goldman's China: A New History (2006; Belknap Press) for more/specifics, especially pages 196 to 200. Jonathan Spence is also very good.

With that out of the way, I should probably focus on the actual topic of the documentary: Winston Churchill and Winston Smith. Honestly, the "Two Winstons" aspect of the documentary is difficult to follow. Eric Blair and "George Orwell" (a pen name) seem to be interchangeable in the documentary, and this makes the viewing experience rather tedious. Perhaps I missed Schama's first allusion that Eric Blair WAS, in fact, George Orwell; as such, the realization that Blair and Orwell are one in the same needs to be made clearer, and from the very beginning. I often find myself wondering who Schama is talking about. Who is this Eric? I also find myself wondering why the documentary strays away from the Winstons. In fact, it does not (well, not really, anyway), and I do not realize this until at least twenty minutes into the documentary. Upon realizing that Blair is Orwell, and Orwell is Blair, I further realize that the documentary provides essential historical/biographical insight into Orwell's writings; had I had time to read the optional Orwell assignment, this information might have been vital and/or enlightening. As such, for me, the documentary merely provides historical insight into British history and biographical insight into Winston Churchill (e.g. ideas about writing and democracy), as well as an introduction to Orwell, who I now know was born Eric Blair. In all, the documentary provides a fairly in-depth look at Churchill (e.g., I did not know that the "majority of his party" mistrusted him, at least during the evacuation of children), but it seems that identity confusion hurts the Orwell aspect of the film, making the "Two Winstons" connection more difficult to see/understand (at least for me, that is). Furthermore, in Schama's treatment of the Chinese as well as that of America, his bias as an Englishman definitely shows—which Kyle pointed out.