By Philippa Tracy
Who was Eileen O’Shaughnessy? She is perhaps better known as the first wife of writer George Orwell (Eric Blair). In a particularly burdensome moment of what she calls “a motherload of wifedom,” the writer Anna Funder turned to Orwell for insight. Having worked her way through his writings and six major biographies, she then read six letters from Eileen to her best friend Norah Symes written over
