To Orwell Today,

Dear Ms Jura,

Just wanted to share the following with you RE: the dialogue exchanged between yourself and Julian Evans, concerning Julian's efforts to locate a copy of 'Remembering Orwell' (Julian first contacting you in the hope that you may have had a line on one, yourself however knowing of 1 copy only and that being your own, Julian searching throughout the next 18 months before finally locating one via abebooks). See LOOKING FOR REMEMBERING ORWELL

Only moments prior to coming across the above mentioned exchange of emails, at the above mentioned site, I typed into the search bar at abebooks the title 'Remembering Orwell' in a bid to learn how much money it may be worth.

See, approximately 3 months ago I came across 2 large rubber-like garbage cans sitting out on the curb the evening prior to garbage day and it just so happened that they were both overflowing with what I eventually determined to be someone's 'lost' book collection (coming to this conclusion as I sorted through them all in my basement after successfully offering a random gentleman $5 to drive myself and both of the garbage cans 4 blocks back to my place, as there was no way I was willing to simply continue on my way and pass them up nor was I willing to take the chance of leaving them while I made my way home and returned so that I may bring them back myself). It being the end of the month and myself finding them out front a apartment building I assume the landlord put the books on the curb because they were left behind by a recent tenant for one reason or another.

I live in Kitchener and with there being 2 Universities and a popular College in the area there are tens of thousands of students living here and twice a year, once before xmas and once before summer, the curbs around here become lined with the goods of students who are done with their schooling and appear to have no interest in bringing the majority of their belongings back (to their parents) home with them. When it was all said and done and I had finished going through all of the books (too many of them 'roughed up' as they were simply tossed into the garbage cans) I don't believe there to be anything of extraordinary value and/or importance. However there was more than enough in the $50 - $100+ range to have made it well worth my while.

One of the titles I am now the proud owner of is Wadham's 'Remembering Orwell', in better than avg' condition, and pending Julian's interest in it I may have considered passing it along (however it appears as though Julian no longer has a need for it) but it's something I'm genuinely interested in myself and judging by the apparent difficulty in finding one out there I'd say I'm just as well to hang on to it and maybe check it out again on abebooks in another 50 years or so :)

Take Care,
Keith

Greetings Keith,

I can't help but think that you better keep that book -- it obviously wanted to be found by you -- maybe it's the beginning of a long enjoyable journey reading all about Orwell.

Your story about finding your copy of REMEMBERING ORWELL reminds me of when I lived and worked in Germany for a couple of years in the 70s. On certain days -- can't remember if it was once a week or once a month -- everyone put old furniture and other things they no longer wanted out on the curb in front of their apartments and houses so that people could take whatever they wanted. That's actually how we furnished much of our apartment!

Thanks for sending along your experience finding Orwell.

All the best,
Jackie Jura

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