The Orwell Foundation has let George Orwell down

George Orwell would not have been surprised by the brouhaha surrounding Kate Clanchy. Two years ago, Clanchy published Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me, a non-fiction book about teaching poetry to disadvantaged schoolchildren which was well-received. Earlier this month a group of offence archaeologists on social media started trawling through it for ‘problematic’ passages and from their point of view it was as if they’d discovered the tomb of Tutankhamun. Clanchy had described an Afghan refugee as having ‘almond-shaped eyes’, another child as having ‘chocolate–coloured skin’ and nicknamed a third ‘African Jonathan’. She had also labelled two autistic children ‘unselfconsciously odd’ and ‘jarring company’.

Before long, a cry of ‘Burn the witch’ was echoing across Twitter and on Friday Clanchy issued a statement explaining how ‘grateful’ she was ‘to those who took the time to challenge my writing’. This was followed by a series of statements from Picador, her publisher, not only expressing their gratitude for ‘the insights’ provided by the witchfinder generals, but apologising for the ‘hurt’ they’d caused.