True Englishman

Having read everything written by, and most written about, George Orwell, I find Susan Forde's reiterated claim that he was somehow Scottish absurd in the extreme (Letters, 17 February).

Has Ms Forde ever read Orwell's Notes on Nationalism, I wonder. There is no doubt he detested nationalism in any of its forms. In this devastating 1945 polemic essay, Orwell, a towering intellect and one of the greatest writers these islands have produced, paraphrases that patriotism is the love of one's own country and nationalism is the hatred of others.

It is really rather sad that Ms Forde feels it necessary to bestow Scottishness on a man so quintessentially English.

One is reminded of the claim that Elvis Presley was also "Scottish" when he stopped off at Prestwick airport on a US army flight from Germany to the States and a letter writer at the time claimed he was "returning to his roots in Ayrshire". When we are reduced to these absurdities, we are indeed in a bad way.

ALEXANDER McKAY

New Cut Rigg

Edinburgh