Searchlight Books

Searchlight Books was a series of essays published as hardback books, edited by T. R. Fyvel and George Orwell. The series was published by Secker & Warburg.[1][2]

The series was projected for 17 titles, of which ten were published during 1941-42, but bomb damage to Warburg's office and the destruction of his printer's paper stock led to the series being discontinued.

The first in the series, The Lion and the Unicorn, was published on 19 February 1941 with an initial run of 5,000 copies, but the number was raised to 7,500. A second printing of 5,000 copies was ordered in March 1941. It sold over 10,000 copies (and was among the most commercially successful of Orwell's books to that date). The destruction of the stock by bombs ended its sales.[2]

Publications by Searchlight Books included the following

• No 1: The Lion and the Unicorn (1941)
• No 2: Offensive Against Germany (1941) by Sebastian Haffner
• No 3: The Lesson of London by Ritchie Calder[3]
• No 4: The English at War (1941) by Cassandra & Philip Zec
• No 5: The End of the Old School Tie by T. C. Worsley - with foreword by Orwell[4][5]
• No 7: Above All Things - Liberty by Michael Foot
• No 8: The Artist and the New World by Cyril Connolly
• No 10: Struggle for the Spanish Soul (1941) by Arturo Barea[6]
• No 11: The Case for African Freedom (1941)[7] by Joyce Cary - with foreword by Orwell
• No 12: Can Britain and America Unite? by B.E.Catlin
• No 13: The Streets of Europe by Arthur Koestler
• No 16: Beyond the "Isms" by Olaf Stapledon

Number of publication not known

• Dover Front by Reginald Foster
• Life and the Poet (1942) Stephen Spender[8]
• The Moral Blitz by Bernard Causton[9]

Included in the initial project but published after the series was cancelled

• Parents' Revolt by Richard and Kathleen Titmuss[9]

See also

• Bibliography of George Orwell

References

1. Costello, David R. (1989) "Searchlight Books and the Quest for a 'People's War', 1941-42", in: JContHist 24, 1989, p. 257 Journal of Contemporary History. Retrieved 18 June 2013.
2. Daniel J. Leab. George Orwell The Lion and the Unicorn: Socialism and the English Genius
3. Štanský, Peter (2007) The First Day of the Blitz: September 7, 1940, p. 190. Yale University Press At Google books. Retrieved 18 June 2013.
4. Watson, George and Ian Roy Willison (1969) The New Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature, Volume 1. p. 691. CUP Archive At Google books. Retrieved 18 June 2013.
5. The end of the "old school tie" (Book, 1941) [WorldCat.org] At WorldCat.org. Retrieved 26 May 2016.
6. Horizon, p. 219. September 1941 Review Retrieved 18 June 2013.
7. Remembering George Orwell: "Foreword" Retrieved 18 June 2013.
8. Wilford, Hugh (2003) The Cia, the British Left and the Cold War: Calling the Tune?, p. 13. Routledge At Google books. Retrieved 18 June 2013.
9. Newsinger, J. Orwell's Politics, pp. 77-86. Springer, 1999. At Google books. Retrieved 27 October 2017.