Search Results for: future vision

What does the future you want look like? What’s standing in the way? How can we work to realise a better vision for our future together?

George Orwell wrote to alter perceptions on the kind of future society we want. In 2020, the Orwell Youth Prize asked young people aged 12 -18 to decide that future.

Journalism, essays, short stories, blog posts, poems, and plays were all welcome. Like the future,  responses to the 2020 theme was their choice. These resources, however, were used to provide that initial spark, and we hope they will continue to assist young writers articulate their vision of the future.

George Orwell and the Future

An Online Workshop – The Future We Want Now

Delia Jarrett-Macauley – Creative Writing Prompts and Ideas

A Message to the Orwell Youth Prize Entrants from Richard Blair, George Orwell’s Son

The Future We Want – Covid-19

Reading Recommendations

WHY ORWELL?

‘To take a rational political decision one must have a picture of the future’

(George Orwell, ‘Arthur Koestler’, 1944)

‘Nearly all creators of Utopia have resembled the man who has toothache, and therefore thinks happiness consists in not having toothache…whoever tries to imagine perfection simply reveals his own emptiness.’

George Orwell – ‘Can Socialists be Happy?‘ 1943.

‘One often has to aim at objectives which one can only very dimly see.’

George Orwell – ‘Can Socialists be Happy?‘ 1943.

‘Political purpose – using the word ‘political’ in the widest possible sense. Desire to push the world in a certain direction, to alter other people’s idea of the kind of society that they should strive after.’

George Orwell – ‘Why I Write‘ 1946

‘All revolutions are failures, but they are not all the same failure.’

George Orwell – ‘Arthur Koestler‘ 1944.

It makes sense to start with the man himself. Orwell wrote in a time of momentous historical change and critically engaged with the intellectual current of his time. Grand ideologies competed for dominance, where capitalism, communism, socialism, and fascism were pitted against each other on the international stage. His contemporaries were deeply optimistic about the potential for the seemingly relentless advance of technology to reshape human society and, in consequence, human nature itself.

Orwell is best remembered today for his satirical account of totalitarian regimes and his sceptical approach to the motivations underpinning utopian visions. Animal Farm (1945) and Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) offer dystopian accounts of failed utopian projects and act as a ‘warning’ for his contemporaries. Orwell, however, never lost his faith in the possibility of a more humane society. His writing aimed ‘to alter other people’s idea of the kind of society that they should strive after.’

If you are interested in learning more about Orwell’s writing on social change and the future, you can read a more detailed account here.

THE WORLD TODAY

Today we tend to share Orwell’s scepticism towards grand utopian impulses and prefer to allow each of us to decide our own futures. However, we are currently living through uncertain times that impact our collective future. The climate crisis, divisive politics, deep inequality, and technology’s irreversible impact on society forces us to consider a question that pervades Orwell’s writing: what kind of society do we want to live in?

We have included a few links below for you to explore the factors that define how we approach this question. We will update this list throughout the course of the prize, but your reading should not be limited to the list below. Be inquisitive and critically engage with news items and articles you read. Most importantly, keep questioning the world around you and be radical in your solutions.

CLIMATE CHANGE

FIRST STOP OUR CLIMATE CHANGE RESOURCE 

Extra ideas…

Read

Greta Thunberg’s Speech ‘You Did not Act in Time’

RSA Resources on Climate Change

Nine Original Poems on Climate Change

Listen

Naming and Shaming the Polluters (The Guardian)

Are Extinction Rebellion the new Suffragettes?

Watch

Samsa – Anthropocene ft. Atlas

EDUCATION

Read

Should there be comprehensive universities?

The Stormzy Effect

Getting In

Watch

The Future of Education (Sajan George)

TECHNOLOGY & AI

Read

Elon Musk: The Architect of Tomorrow (Neil Strauss)

Would you recognise yourself from your data?

PLACE & COMMUNITY

Read

Meanwhile Use of Buildings

The Alternatives: making the economy work for everyone (Aditya Chakrabortty)

The rebel bank, printing its own notes and buying back people’s debts (Anna Leach)  

The Brixton Pound

IDENTITY

Read

What’s The Future of the Feminist Movement? 12 Leading Voices Respond

Should kids be brought up as gender netural? (Catriona White, BBC)

Intersectionality: Why it Matters?

Does Extinction Rebellion have a Race Problem?

‘Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan’s poetry gives us tools to fight back’, an interview by Rosel Jackson Stern for gal-dem

6 Young Women On What The Black Lives Matter Movement Means To Them (Naomi Pike, Vogue) 
Watch

The Kids are Having None of It

Black Lives Matter: Parents and children talk about racism (BBC)

Listen

Kate Bornstein: The Future of Gender

WORK AND POVERTY

Read

RSA The Future of Work

Ending the Poverty Premium

Crumbling Britain: Big Issue competitors arrive as rough sleeping rises, Anoosh Chakelian, New Statesman 

Need some more information on what we want to change. Check out our resources on: Food Poverty  & Poverty Premium Resource

Listen

Deprivation Discourse – podcast series where young people are co-creators by Elif Emma True

MENTAL HEALTH

Read

In Mind: Found on Mental Health (The Guardian)

Is young people’s mental health getting worse? 

ART, TECHNOLOGY & POLITICS

Read

What will art look like in 20 years?

Listen

New Ways of Seeing

Tate Podcast: Art & Protest 

POLITICS & DEMOCRACY

Read

Politics as usual can’t fix the climate crisis Maybe it’s time to try a citizens’ assembly

The Case for Reparations

Why Donald Trump is proving George Orwell wrong

Watch

Knock Down the House

The Tate Podcast: Art & Protest

UTOPIAN FICTION

Read

Ecotopia (1975), Ernest Callenbach

Island (1962), Aldous Huxley

Herland (1915), Charlotte Perkins Gilman

The Dispossessed (1974) Ursula K. Le Guin

What We Can At Least Afford to Lose, Luke Kennard

Watch

Avatar (2009), James Cameron

WRITING ADVICE

Guide to Style

Guide to Form

Encountering Orwell

The brilliant work of previous winners of the Orwell Youth Prize

If you have any further questions, suggestions, or thoughts, please get in touch with Alex Talbott, alextalbott@orwellyouthprize.co.uk

THE FUTURE WE WANT – OYP THEME 2020

Orwell’s own writing was profoundly concerned with social change, the relationship between past, present and future, and what this means for the individual. His most celebrated and revisited work Nineteen Eighty-Four presented a chilling dystopian vision of the future which still unsettles and provokes today. But this dark vision was rooted in his belief that a better, more equal world was achievable, a belief which inspired him to make the journeys, both imaginative and real, which produced classics like The Road to Wigan Pier and Homage to Catalonia, as well as essays like The Lion and the Unicorn, which looked forward to the recreation of England after the Second World War.

All ‘favourable’ Utopias seem to be alike in postulating perfection while being unable to suggest happiness… It would seem that human beings are not able to describe, nor perhaps to imagine, happiness except in terms of contrast.

(‘Can Socialists Be Happy?’, 1943)

 

POLITICAL TURMOIL

George Orwell wrote because he wanted to change the world. In 1946, Looking back on his journey to becoming a writer, Orwell claimed that his main motivation was ‘political purpose’. Orwell defined ‘political purpose’, in the widest possible sense as a ‘desire to push the world in a certain direction, to alter other people’s idea of the kind of society that they should strive after’. Today, Orwell’s desire to push the world in a certain direction has inspired writers and campaigners across the world, whether in politics, journalism or civil society, as well as countless individual readers.

But it was also the turbulent times he lived in which made George Orwell the writer he was. Orwell was writing during two of the most momentous decades of the twentieth century, the nineteen-thirties and the nineteen-forties, when the kind of society people should strive after were fiercely contested. As conflict spiralled around the globe, powerful ideologies like fascism, communism and socialism reshaped politics, and scientific and technological progress opened up new scope for human action, writers and commentators believed that the world was on the brink of a disorientating multitude of possible futures.

ORWELL THE ACTIVIST

What George Orwell wrote was a direct result of the actions he took. His investigations into homelessness in London and Paris, and the life of the labouring poor in the north of England, made him a fierce critic of inequality. In 1936 George Orwell went to Spain to fight in the Spanish Civil War as part of the ‘International Brigade’, socialists from across the world who were committed to supporting the Republican government: what he learnt about the activities of the Soviet-backed Communist Party in Spain led him to write Homage to Catalonia.  He returned to England (only just escaping with his life) and in the 1940s took part in the Second World War, working for the BBC to promote the British view of the war in India, which was then part of the British Empire.

If his experience in the 1930s made Orwell a political writer (he once said that ‘every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or directly, against totalitarians and for democratic socialism, as I understand it’) it was his experience of ‘total war’ in the 1940s convinced him that revolutionary change was possible in the United Kingdom, and argument which he made in his essay, ‘The Lion and the Unicorn’ (subtitled ‘Socialism and the English Genius’).

ORWELL AND UTOPIA

Although a committed socialist, George Orwell was often sceptical of the motivations behind grand claims to transform society. In many of his essays, Orwell asked perceptive questions of the utopian visions which many of his fellow reformers, inspired by rapid technological advances and optimistic visions of human nature, were caught up in. “All ‘favourable’ Utopias,” Orwell wrote, “seem to be alike in postulating perfection while being unable to suggest happiness.” What, Orwell wanted to know, would the future really be like when it came?

As the dark visions of revolutions ‘gone wrong’ in Animal Farm (1945) and Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) suggest, Orwell was not confident that change is always for the better. Yet these novels were also born out of a conviction that the futures they described did not have to happen, if ordinary people were vigilant and defended the values they believed in. Orwell described Nineteen Eighty-Four, with its dark vision of a bureaucratic state, the denial of objective truth and crushing of individual freedom as a ‘warning’. “The moral to be drawn from this dangerous nightmare situation is a simple one,” he said when Nineteen Eighty-Four was published. “Don’t let it happen. It depends on you.”

READ: Dorian Lynskey, ‘1984 at 70’

WATCH: 1984 Live: Dramatized live reading of ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’, featuring actors and members of the public alongside prominent writers, journalists and broadcasters who, like Orwell, have grappled with issues of free speech, history and propaganda.

“Remarkable technically, in its control of pace and paragraph, and in the author’s manipulation of readerly expectation.” – Will Harris, Forward Prize-winning poet and Orwell Youth Prize judge 2023

The lights are off, the blinds are closed. Old food has fumigated the room. Dr Courre is stooped in his black leather chair with his face in his hands. A hundred sheets of paper are sprawled across a wide, deep desk.

He has never wanted to stop thinking like he does now.

Yesterday afternoon, there was a results reveal ceremony dedicated to experiments Courre and Dr Senmoore had co-fostered the theory for. Thirty-two personnel were present; nobody wanted to be absent if a celebration was called for. Success there would be monumental, implicating technology that would defy prediction, and guaranteeing some Nobel Prize winners. Courre did not seek recognition like some of his colleagues, but contributing to his field in such permanent fashion had always held an unavoidable allure, the potential of a transcendent legacy.

And it had gone so well. Every test had proved what it set out to prove. They had secured their coveted five-sigma certainty, assuring this was no fluke nor mistake, but to Courre, the revelations had been the antithesis of all he’d hoped for, and so against everybody’s expectations he fled the room as soon as the reveal was complete.

He was crying. Barrelling through the near-empty halls, careening around the cleaners, his thoughts were frenzied but his steps were purposeful, soon dropping him in his office where he pulled out the papers. He wasn’t revisiting anything published or revised – some uninformed acquaintances would later theorise that he had done just that, looking for just one single flaw – but he instead had sought his notes.

Courre’s notation had developed quiet notoriety among his colleagues. Few had seen it and none had been substantially exposed to it, meaning nobody in the department could vouch for it in any capacity. But, according to the few, they would be able to recognise it anywhere. Rumours claimed the script to be many outlandish things. This always amused Courre. One such rumour was that Courre had pursued a covert alliance with a Dutch hobbyist logician after Courre realised, during online correspondence regarding the hobbyist’s publications, that this person understood esoteric notation better than Dutch. They were supposedly developing it together. This rumour was true.

Yesterday and today proved the script to be far removed, still, from all of their expectations. Courre himself could not have foreseen its potential.

In ten minutes, he knows Senmoore will come and confront him about his behaviour. At first, he was not sure he was ready for this, but the inevitability of the events demands composure from him: he has seen he will be capable and so it will be.

Senmoore will expect satisfying answers because anything less would be a waste of her time. That is how she would describe her attitude if questioned, which she won’t be, and is how Courre sees her attitude, too. His respect for her is immense yet he feels his stomach wilt at the thought of having to explain what is happening to him. The truth was never Courre’s to keep – this is how he rationalises what he must do. It is weak. He is trying not to admit that he must imminently alter her perception of reality and in doing so he will likely initiate a chain of events that will culminate in the end of modern scientific progress. There will be a “tremendous loss of life.” He does not yet know if he will divulge this.

Leon Courre is seeing the future as clearly as the past, enabled by his language.

This admission will be crucial in the conversation with Senmoore. There can be no room for misinterpretation. In other circumstances, to suggest that simple fluency in a language would be the key to seeing across gaps of time would be entirely unreasonable. The silver lining is that it is Senmoore who will see him first, as Courre doesn’t know if anybody else would listen for long enough to believe him.

If he hadn’t foreseen the events of the reveal ceremony, up to and including the results themselves, he would’ve dismissed his foreboding and deja vu as nervous symptoms, borne both of the day and his Dutch correspondent’s unexplained communication blackout. If not for every anomaly of experience that peppered his morning then he could call this premonition a coincidence or one-off. If he could begin to decipher the events of yesterday without accepting his surreal condition, he would do so. He saw everything, everything in his day, right before it happened or earlier, with sickening visual clarity.

Principles of time and history and fate elude Courre right now. The cosmic implications of what is going on in his head must be swatted away like flies. He sees himself, currently, as an untapped well of crucial knowledge concerning one of man’s greatest achievements, too disoriented and overwhelmed to analyse his current condition. Sitting alone instead, slaving to commit his premonitions to memory, like a spy who has seen crucial intel. When did he stop crying?

It is this clarity of their terrible contents that nauseates Courre. In the absence of his understanding, he has decided he does not want to share the specifics with Senmoore yet. He avoids the spiral of questioning if this was ever his choice to make.

Courre is then sat in a boardroom.

A meeting has begun, with twelve bodyguards standing at the room’s perimeter, and five men in varying suits sitting at a long table. The table reflects the white lights overhead. The airy scent of the clean carpets. Courre doesn’t recognise anyone.

What is he here for? He can still hear voices outside of his office; premonitions only affect his vision. The cold-faced men are addressing him and he is responding while past-him spectates. This is bound to overlap with his meeting with Senmoore.

He watches himself moving next to a whiteboard, sketching diagrams and equations. One diagram forms a bullseye, with a centre labelled 100m across that gets filled in red. Some equations here relate to the reveal yesterday, but they’re being expounded upon. He memorises each glimpse of the board and tries to read the lips of people asking questions, tantalised by these snippets of revelation.

At some point, the 100m circle had been marked with an X. It all clicks for Courre very quickly, and he is hurled back into his body for a brief moment as his body chills. To see his hands point at that board, the words ‘casualties’ and ‘population centres’ alongside ‘maximisation,’ the unchanged expressions of the bureaucrats, stokes a flaming reaction. Courre tenses, his hands now shaking with adrenaline. Haggard reason returns to him as he seeks to formulate a plan. There is no reason he can see to grant these men the power they have consulted him for.

But part of him knows. If he could change any of what he has seen, he would know by now – the truth collecting on the edge of his mind like wisps of smoke. This was the most difficult truth to accept, more so even than his parahuman ability: what he is seeing is the future. Not deja vu, not visualised suspicion. And no matter how visceral his desire he cannot change the truth.

Until now, he had at least known he could control who knew it and prevent the wrong people from knowing the right things. The world he sees coming is not something he wants but it appears to be inevitable.

He sits back, brow unfurling. Inevitable. He plays with the word in his mouth, feeling its five steps over his tongue.

*

Courre opens his eyes and returns to reality, finally exhausted beyond thought but beyond relief, too. The coffee tastes bitter but he’s still cradling it in his hands, sitting near the biscuits. Some hindbrain section relaxes at the sight of voices syncing with lips. It’s funny to him, now, that he could’ve ever thought that so much chatter could originate from just outside his office door, unmuffled and spritely.

He clears a space at the table and pulls a notebook and pen from his breast pocket. Under other circumstances he would have to worry about somebody seeing the things he is about to write.

To his knowledge, that was his first vision within another vision. The disorientation of realising that his hearing, too, had fooled him, is actually negligible. Turning his head to the great projected countdown, his gaze passing a dozen excited faces on its way, he felt a momentary disappointment at having the surprise ruined for him.

Ewan Guarnieri is a senior runner up in The Orwell Youth Prize 2023

“A well argued, reflective and strongly researched analysis of the limits and limitations of meritocracy.” –  Andrew Jack, global education editor for the Financial Times and Orwell Youth Prize judge 2023

Scroll to the end of the page for an interview between Beth and 2019 Orwell Youth Prize winner, Jessica Johnson.

Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, speaking at LSE, 12 March 2002 – credit LSE Library

Upon first glance, a meritocracy – a world in which people can go as far as their merit takes them, and where those in power are there because of their own merit – seems to be a good thing: a marker of an equal society, and something within our grasp. For example, take the grammar school system: students who pass the test have the opportunity to aim high in an academically oriented school; push for the highest grades and attend top universities. However, I am in the majority of students who were tutored to pass the 11+. It is no longer the smartest students who are passing the test, it’s the richest ones. This illusion of meritocracy creates the idea amongst grammar school students that they are more worthy than their peers, and any success that comes their way is a product of their own hard work and talents, rather than a combination of effort, opportunity and, most importantly, luck. This encourages them to look down on their less successful peers; if the ‘winners’ deserve their success then the ‘losers’ deserve their squalor. This meritocratic hubris (Sandel, 2021, 28) is inescapable as long as humans insist on being a selfish species.

The harm caused by a meritocracy is not limited to those who are unsuccessful. The idea of a meritocracy, as it is generally thought of today, focuses heavily on academic success as a marker of merit, undermining the dignity of work and manual labour. A society cannot function on academics and politicians alone; it needs lorry drivers and factory workers. These people who arguably work just as hard as lawyers or doctors are conveniently forgotten in this “Great Meritocracy”. The average university lecturer earns double that of an average cleaner. Are university lecturers, on average, twice as good at what they do? I doubt it.

The culture surrounding elite jobs and education [becomes] more unattainable with every generation that lives through it…

Meritocracy is also bad for those on top: its ‘winners’. The culture surrounding elite jobs and education exacerbates itself, becoming more unattainable with every generation that lives through it, slowly destroying the welfare of those that are thriving, making their topple inevitable. In recent years, various reports have shown that students feel that their mental health has been significantly impacted by the pressures of elite academic settings. An apt reflection of this is that young people in “high-achieving” settings experience up to seven times the levels of anxiety and depression as their peers in other school settings (Luthar, 2020, 7); the ‘winners’ are actively being harmed by their ‘prize’.

The Achilles’ heel of a meritocracy is not its own fault. Instead it is due to our society’s values. Perhaps, if we were to completely reconstruct society from its foundations, a fair meritocracy would be viable, but the ideas that rule make it an impossibility. A meritocracy cannot work in a society that values superiority over success like our own. How can one go as far as their merit takes them, when there can only be the top “1%” with the other 99 below it? Someone, in fact most people, have to be losing, just so those who do win can gorge themselves on their spoils. The attraction of a meritocracy is its promise of equality for how can a society with superiority as its pillar, be, in any way shape or form, equal?

The idea of being successful is almost synonymous with being wealthy.

Another pitfall of meritocracy is the fault of our society. The idea of being successful is almost synonymous with being wealthy. You are not seen as successful if you’re not wealthy, and you are successful if you are wealthy with no regard to how hard you’ve worked or how good you are at what you do, as it is assumed that you must be one of the elites to walk among them. This is typified in grammar schools. It is not possible for everyone to be successful when wealth accumulation is the proxy measure of success. For a meritocracy to even be a consideration, we need to decouple achievement from wealth, and deconstruct our ideas of what it means to be successful. As it is, there is a lottery of birth, as there is a very strong correlation between the material wealth of the family a child is born into and their educational attainment (von Stumm et al., 2022), therefore creating a plutocracy, rather than the “Great Meritocracy” that has been promised to us time and time again. By Tony Blair in 1999 (White & Blair, 1999), by Theresa May in 2016 (May, 2016) and by Boris Johnson in 2019 (Havery & Caldecott, 2019). The inability to deliver equality of opportunity as promised transcends both decades and parties; Prime Ministers united in their inability to provide equality for their people.

A true meritocracy would be better for those within it.

Given that the premise of this article is that we do not live in a meritocracy, one question persists: would a genuine meritocracy be an improvement? I believe that a true meritocracy would be better for those within it. A prerequisite for this meritocracy is for everyone to be provided with a meaningful opportunity to thrive. In this alternate reality, people would be free to shape their own dreams, rather than mould them in the cast of wealth. Any avenue they chase would be in pursuit of self-actualization, rather than a necessity of survival, eradicating this race for wealth we justify by falsely calling it a meritocracy. Under this new status quo, division of resources would be equitable and therefore achievement would primarily be for self-fulfilment rather than material gain.

This meritocracy works because by removing the shackles of economic expediency; everyone is free to fulfil their potential. Therefore, everyone lives in a world of their own personal bests being achieved and is fulfilled and content. In this true meritocracy, everyone is happy. However, this construct will remain a fantasy until such a time as human rights are expanded to meet all genuine human needs to be able to live a free life. The economic imperatives of food, shelter and clothing will prevent a true meritocracy from ever coming to fruition.

It can be hard to look outside of our own veil of ignorance and challenge things we know to be unfair. It’s easy to justify our own situation by demeaning our own power and influence. We do not live in a meritocracy and the idea that we do is poisoning us. As long as we use the bodies of this impossible system’s losers as a platform to elevate the wealthy; we are doomed to be forever divided. We are fed success stories as a way to incentivize the masses, when we all know that success stories are just that. Stories.

Until we stop focussing on personal gain and instead look towards common good, meritocracy, despite being promised, will remain a pipe dream.

References 

Havery, G., & Caldecott, S. (2019, December 14). Boris Johnson holds victory rally in Sedgefield. The Northern Echo.

https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/18101982.boris-johnson-holds-victory-rally sedgefield/

Luthar, S. S. (2020, June). Students in High-Achieving Schools: Perils of Pressures to Be “Standouts”. Adversity and Resilience Science, 7.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342718560_Students_in_High-Achieving_S chools_Perils_of_Pressures_to_Be_Standouts

May, T. (2016, September 9). Britain, the great meritocracy: Prime Minister’s speech. GOV.UK. Retrieved May 20, 2023, from

https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/britain-the-great-meritocracy-prime-ministe rs-speech

Sandel, M. J. (2021). The Tyranny of Merit: What’s Become of the Common Good? Penguin Books, Limited.

von Stumm, S., Cave, S. N., & Wakeling, P. (2022). Persistent association between family socioeconomic status and primary school performance in Britain over 95 years. npj Science of Learning.

White, M., & Blair, T. (1999, January 15). Blair hails middle class revolution | Politics. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/1999/jan/15/uk.politicalnews1

We asked previous winners and runners up of the Orwell Youth Prize to interview the 2023 cohort about their Orwell Youth Prize writing. Below, 2019 winner, Jessica Johnson, interviews 2023 winner, Beth Anker, about meritocracy, educational inequality, and the importance of valuing academic success rather than academic superiority:

Jess:  In the first paragraph you mention you were tutored to pass the 11+, what made you want to write about meritocracy from your position in it?

Beth:  I think the initial drive to write about meritocracy came from the people I’m surrounded by. A lot of the people at my school would’ve attended a private school had they not passed the 11+, the people that can afford private school make up such a disproportionately small percentage of the population compared to how they’re represented in grammar schools it made me start thinking about if ‘smarts’ (I don’t mean smarts really, it’s for a lack of a better word to describe the type of people grammar schools test for), is really the trait that grammar schools find in people, when so many seem to have lots of money too. Also considering what areas of the country have grammar schools fully instituted (Buckinghamshire, Kent and Yorkshire), are all among some of the most affluent areas outside of London. I believe recognising unfair systems that you are benefiting from is so important, and that often those within them are some of the best equipped to critique them.

Jess: What do you think about the future of education, especially considering some of the evidence that suggests mixed-ability teaching can improve overall attainment?

Beth: It’s clear our education system, which is full of division and disparity, will only reproduce inequality. If we look towards Finland as an example, by creating a ‘common’ school and working to abolish fee paying and selective schools, we can provide a better education system for every student. I think the reason a lot of parents are resistant to this change is because they believe that their child will be receiving a worse education just so others can receive a better one. The policymakers making decisions regarding overhauls like this also tend to be the same intransigent parents. However I don’t believe this perceived damage to their child’s education is a prerequisite for the common school. Instead it is about levelling up comprehensive schooling until it is comparable to selective and fee paying schooling, which in some cases it is. Once this has occurred there is no real reason, outside of to pay for your child to attend an independent school, or tutor your child to pass the 11+, thus making independent and grammar schools obsolete. I can’t even begin to imagine how big of an overhaul would be necessary to achieve this goal of equal schooling, especially with such an exam-focused education system. However it is so important that all students are provided with equal opportunities to thrive. The highest attaining students’ success should not have to depend on the lowest attaining students’ ‘failure’.

Jess: How do you think we balance valuing academic success and other achievements equally with trying to improve educational equality across the classes?

Beth: I think the main struggle in balancing valuing achievements and improving educational equality, is it seems that it would become easy to ignore high achieving students in favour of those who are struggling, and thus their grades begin to slip, creating a cycle where there are always students at the bottom. I actually think the way to avoid this is by valuing academic success. In valuing academic success, and not academic superiority, it is possible for every student to cross the ‘bar’ for academic achievement. If one student gets 90% and another 70%, it doesn’t matter as long as they both pass the test. In this way academic achievement becomes attainable for all students, making improving education equality easier as it provides clear goalposts to aim for. Schools can provide further opportunities for students already achieving academic success to deepen their knowledge and work with classes to improve their attainment.

Jess: Graduates from top universities appear to be increasingly applying for jobs in law and finance, are other less well-paid sectors missing out on our brightest minds?

Beth: In some cases, yes. There absolutely are sectors that are struggling and need more people working in them, especially people with higher education but the sectors don’t have the means to attract them. However, I believe that passion is more important than a prestigious degree, and if someone truly wants to work in a sector, a lower salary would not dissuade them. All sectors are better off with a passionate workforce, with less prestigious degrees or no degrees at all, than graduates from top universities attracted by a paycheck.

Beth Anker is a junior winner in The Orwell Youth Prize 2023

There are currently four prizes:

• The Orwell Prize for Political Writing awarded to a work of non-fiction. ‘Political’ is defined in the broadest sense, including entries addressing political, social, cultural, moral and historical subjects.
• The Orwell Prize for Political Fiction awarded to a work of fiction, including short stories, graphic novels and YA.
• The Orwell Prize for Journalism awarded to a journalist for sustained reportage and/or commentary working in any medium.
• The Orwell Prize for Reporting Homelessness awarded for reportage and/or commentary on homelessness.

In addition, Special Prizes may be awarded at the discretion of the judges. You can find the rules for The Orwell Prize 2025 below. Please note that rules are updated each year.

“This is a unique, well-written and interesting piece, which explores how small, persistent changes can impact an individual’s entire life course. It also demonstrates how the kindness of one person can contribute to changing someone else’s life, providing a sincere depiction on the impact of helping young people in difficult situations.” – Jessica Johnson

Part 1

It started with a glass of water, subsequent to waking up. I had read the health benefits
online, including how it could give you a burst of energy in the morning. Exactly what I
needed. This was my starting small.

It was 2019, 4 months after my 16th birthday, when It was necessary for me to move out.
Circumstantial. Much like a baby bird set to dispatch from its nest, able to fly, yet still
vulnerable. However, I fortunately had years of taking care of myself under my little belt.
Cooking, cleaning and being responsible for my emotional well being, the things a mother or
father may be responsible for. Longlands was where I found myself. Right at the heart of
Middlesbrough; where housing was cheap. An eminently working class area, wrapped in the
decay of its industrial past, pervaded with violence, crime, amongst many other things.
Nothing I wasn’t used to. Now alone, an empowering yet corrupting freedom overwhelmed
me, driving me away from college.

Consequently, after a few months, I accumulated a new group of friends. Acquaintances in
retrospect. Vivacious types, though flippant. I believe it is Jim Rhon who famously said “You
are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.”. A statement, which I’m
ashamed to admit is truth laden. Each other weekend was spent frivolously, then every
weekend, until we had justified almost everyday of the week to be one for drinking. It took 5
months for these actions to finally catch up with me. Due to a breach of tenancy caused by
excessive noise and partying, I was asked to leave. I did. I was now overwhelmed by a
sense of excitement and relief; to have knowledge of a new, hopefully more positive
direction, despite not knowing quite where that was.

It was now required of me to live with an adult, social services no longer trusted me. This
was May time; spring was in full swing. I stayed with my mum until I was introduced to the
man whose house I was to live in, there was no alternative. lockdown had limited my options
greatly. The house was in a small town, fairly quiet, 30 minutes drive from my previous
home, well maybe not a home, a house. The man, Adrian, was kind and roughly aged 30
something, that’s all I could really tell at first, and so I moved in just a little under a week
later. I was shown to my designated bedroom, small, but canny and very clean and began to
unpack my belongings. When my social worker had left, it was just Adrian and I. What to do
next I wasn’t sure. I left my bedroom door open as I didn’t want to seem ill mannered.
Adrian, shuffling about the house just like me unaware what to do with a stranger in his
home, came to tell me that he was always there to talk, and if I needed anything, just to ask.
He kept this promise.

Now in a much more stable position, I felt inclined to make the decision to change the
direction of my life. And such a satisfactory one after months of feeling as though my future
was not in my control. I made the decision to not just go back to sixth form but to repeat year
12. I asked my teachers, to which fortunately they agreed. And so, I was set to start the year
anew.

This wasn’t the only new thing for me. Seeing Adrian get out of bed in the morning, and go to
work everyday was new to me too. I didn’t really know anyone who had a job other than my teachers. All of my mum’s friends stayed at home with children watching tv, if social services
hadn’t already taken their children away. Another new thing was restaurants. Of course I’d
been in restaurants a few times with friends, even worked in them when times were hard, but
I had never been with a parent. Adrian and I went for breakfasts,
lunches and dinners at least one a week (once lockdown was lifted). Breakfast was my
favorite. We would sit by the window, watching inaudible hordes of people rushing by.
Watching the world in motion, coffee in hand with its tantalising steam unfurling in the
morning air. The sun’s delicate rays streaming through the window, warming my skin.

Part 2

It started with a glass of water, subsequent to waking up. I had read the health benefits
online, including how it could give you a burst of energy in the morning . Exactly what I
needed. This was my starting small. I had also read it takes 21 days to build a habit, this is
what I intended to do: build habits, healthy ones. Bit by bit, I dedicated myself to building a
morning routine, fit for a student. This included waking up at 5am, some may say
excruciatingly early, exercising, practising gratitude, reading and so on. Morning became my
favorite time of day.

September came quick enough, and the return to sixth form was fairly smooth, despite a
new year of people who I didn’t know. Although I made no conscious effort to make friends, I
did remain amiable, as always. I had been a consistent D grade student the latter end of my
secondary experience. I had never got an outstanding, or even good grade. Now in the
same position as most of those around me with a new year, I was no longer going to be that
blasè student, who produced such subpar work. Instead, I was going to achieve something I
had never achieved before, grades I was proud of. I now had someone in my life other than
myself who was interested in my education, Adrian. He would ask what I had learnt that day,
did I enjoy college and most striking of all to me, what university I wanted to attend. This
engagement was such a stark contrast to the slurred, insouciant “Aw ye” I would receive
from my mother when trying to tell her what I had learnt at school as a child. I suppose such
things don’t interest everyone. At the start of my journey in a new direction, I held a lot of
resentment for my mother. I don’t anymore, I learnt to let go. How freeing it was. I realise
now that grasping on to such feelings would only hold me back, like a tin can on the end of a
kite, desperate to fly. It struck me that maybe the past can’t change, but I can.

How to answer Adrian’s question, I didn’t really know. No one I can recall had ever asked me
if or what university I wanted to attend. This would imply they believed I wanted to go to uni,
could get into uni. This would imply that they had faith, so no one ever asked.

One day, while in sixth form, I overheard a conversation discussing university. Whoever it
was, wanted to go to Oxford. I was stunned by this. Being from the North East I believed
Oxford was for ‘smart rich people’, and that it was impossible to get in there. With my
curiosity sparked, I took to Google and searched for the course I was interested in on the
Oxford website. I wanted to see what Oxford life was like and what grades I needed. From
here it was clear to me, what I wanted and how I was going to achieve it. I was to get no less
than 3 A’s at the end of year 13, to study literature and english language. My dream course
at what was now my dream university.

The stereotypes of Oxford students, and me not fitting that (especially being of ethnic origin),
had not discouraged me. The knowledge of such a place, with so many people to converse
with on an intellectual level excited me. I intended to build my cultural capital, something I
had never really paid attention to before. For me this included reading classic literature (now
my preferred genre), starting violin lessons, writing, and expanding my vocabulary. Although
this may seem like a desperate effort to fit a mould I’am destined not to fit, such things are
so natural to me now. As though it’s what I should have always been doing. As though I’ve
been missing out.

Part 3

Adrian and I no longer live together. We parted on peaceful terms in November, due to my
need for independence. The progress I made while with Adrian had given social services the
trust they needed to allow me to live independently again. I could not express more how
grateful I am for what he offered me, stability. Now I live in a flat, closer to Sixth Form. I
adjusted exceedingly quickly as I always do. I remain with the same habits, and my mental
health as stable as it was previously with Adrian. I can every so often become indifferent to
my studies while at home. However, the reminder of my future provides sufficient motivation
to get back to it. The vision of my clothes, my books, my life in boxes in the boot of a car,
ready to drive and unpack in my room, at Oxford University.

Still, I intend to go in this new direction. To break my family’s cycle which none have
attempted to break. To walk a path that no one has paved for me but myself. To make no
one proud but myself.

It started with a glass of water, subsequent to waking up. This was my starting small.

A Love Symphony to the World

uncountable specks of embers

Void
Better off than Guatemalan women,
War rape survivors, coping with trauma.
Better off than naïve, Columbian girls;
Those recruited as soldiers, dauntless and brave,
But behind closed doors, always preyed as sex slaves.
Better off than the girls in Bangladesh.
Precious and worthy and fifteen, like me,
Wear not uniforms, instead wedding sarees.
But at least they have husbands and families;
Yet clearly, they are children, simply not ladies.

Stop whining in your high-pitched squeal.
You’re better off than them. Don’t be a diva.
Close your legs. Wear dresses not skirts.
Put on make-up. Look ladylike and presentable.
But no tank tops. They make you a whore.

Don’t go into politics. You’re a girl.
Don’t tell me you will fight for women’s rights.
You can study, vote, drive, go on maternity leaves.
Tell me what else do you think you need?
You’re so self-entitled. Never be a feminist.

When being ‘feminist’ becomes an insult,
When being a ‘girl’ means not to speak out.
Clutching onto virtues of hope and justice,
Guided hand in hand through this dark abyss,
We will never be silenced nor extinguished.

scattered separate, weak and powerless

Masquerade
How long does it take to realise
Not everyone is white, skinny, tall,
With long legs and full breasts.
How long does it take to conceive
‘Almond-shaped’ eyes are not
Invitations to be labelled as Chinks.

How long does it take to apprehend
The cruelty shown by a casual remark ‘
Were your parents once slaves?’

Does it take the genocide of six million Jews,
Or the ethnic cleansing of Muslims in Myanmar,
To discover appearances and beliefs
Are nothing but masquerades kept up?

Or does it take a masquerade ball
With our identities hidden by masks;
To relive without judgement,
To relearn we are human?

Ignited with shared passion

Hostage
secrets hidden
worries piling up
and hushed whispers
of anxiety: voices echoing
louder and louder constantly.
smiles stretched on faces and
it is so, so effortless to pretend
everything is alright and you are
happy. No one could envision tears
streaming down in the shower every
evening and pillows damp with teardrops
every night. No one hears the pleas behind
the pretty visage screaming and shrieking for
help. Notice the eyes emptied with no happiness,
no hope and no life. Sweatshirts, hoodies, sleeves hide
battle scars. They cover the body you starved to achieve too.
most afraid at nights and when alone, of the hands, the body,
most importantly the brain. It threatens and menaces the entire
existence. ‘you wear a false smile that does not reach your eyes too?
you are an unpaid, skilled, two-faced actor too? Same. What a small world.’

Rising from ashes

Closure

Lace your fingers through mine.
Written in the stars; with time we align.

World War One murdered 75 million
World War Two killed 85 million
Stalin’s regime exterminated 20 million
The Great Leap Forward destroyed 45 million
These are not statistics made up by Satan
But innocent lives, wiped out without reason.
These are the downfalls of humanity, listen,
We still are collectively hurting, as a victim.

Piece by piece, communities repair,
Learning to hold each other tighter, I swear.
Pain never stops, the world is still impaired

Especially right now, COVID-19 everywhere.
It terrifies us – the infamous lack of Medicare.
Will this end. I wonder – are you just as scared.
Do not be afraid. Our hearts will heal together
Evidenced by the challenges faced here and there.

There is love in the lullaby sung to a wailing infant.
There is love in the handshake when two hands collide.
There is love in the steps taken in order to reach home.
There is love in the smile of the neighbour down the road.
There is love in the way the wind caressed and kissed many faces.
There is love in the tears of a father in his daughter’s wedding.
There is love in the music listened on the way to work.
There is love in the mundane moments if we are willing to love.

You are a broken angel I have met on earth.
Heal with me; we await a rebirth.

hand in hand like phoenixes

Grace

I want to be able to tell my children
That the 36% of the world
No longer have to live in poverty.

I want to be able to tell my children
That the 25% of the world
Now can access adequate sanitation.

I want to be able to tell my children
That there is no need to worry about
The horrors of World War Three emerging.

I want to be able to tell my children
That the sea turtles, tigers and leopards
Exist in books and in reality.

I want to be able to tell my children
That their futures will not be limited
Because of many superficial reasons

I want to be able to tell my children
That the education they receive
Is universal, not birth lottery.

I want to be able to tell my children
That the society is accepting of
Boys liking boys and girls liking girls.

I want to be able to tell my children
That their mental health matters
Just as much as their physical health.

I want to be able to tell my children
That the world cares for every one of them
And is highly capable of loving them.

And if I cannot tell this to the future generation
And show them the green mountains and the cerulean oceans.
At least I want to be able to tell my children,
I once fought for their world without any hesitation.
together we will rise and we will love

***

This passionate and well researched poem stayed in my mind long after I read these words – just as the best poems should!  Kerry Hudson, Orwell Youth Prize Judge

‘A Love Symphony to the World’ is a junior Orwell Youth Prize 2020 Runner Up, responding to the theme ‘The Future We Want’.

What he left me with

“Aut viam inveniam aut faciam.”

Seven. He took me to church for the first time. The quintessential eldest child: staid, astute
and a keen leader. The drill sergeant: he issued commands and I obliged. In my
neighbourhood characterised by deprivation, church was not a building but the unity
between the people within it. I understood that we had to rely on a duty of care towards our
neighbours. The dilapidated buildings and overwhelmed public systems were mere
reminders of our inferiority. The government and police could never replicate that loyalty we
upheld towards one another. The most poignant memory I have from that day was after the
service when we passed an ice cream truck. I was in a mood, intensely craving an ice
cream laden with toppings. He saw. He saw me and my longing glances and satisfied my
desires. He watched me erupt with happiness while he stood beside me with a howling
stomach. He never did hesitate to appease me.

Just before eleven. He got a job for the first time. He walked up to Mama and told her he
was taking control, smirking excitedly at the tantalising promise of financial freedom. To
him, that first check was a symbol of hope, emblematic of a better life. Determined to find a
way to escape poverty’s vicious cycle and the streets, he spent hours hustling. Washing
dishes at the local diner for minimum wage until his hands were embroidered with vibrant
patches of eczema while working to maintain his GPA. He envisioned that he would
become somebody, inspiring us in the process. His goals were hyper-focused and
desperate to be fulfilled.

Only thirteen. He confirmed what I already knew about this world. I was poor, I witnessed
poverty in the face of my mother; her premature wrinkles told the story of a life tainted by
pain, suffering and hard labour. Capitalism’s demands saddled her with myriad health
problems. Late notices in a heap by my front door regularly reminded me of my dire
financial situation. Gentrification had brought burgeoning rent which was impossible for my
mother to meet on her own, the need to simply survive forced her to take on every job she
could find. My clothes were from thrift stores before the gentrification of thrift stores only
highlighting our position within the societal hierarchy. The sirens which played vociferously
randomly resulted in impulses of primal fear. Death permeated our community; connecting
us but also affirming that although suburbia was 40 minutes away, the gap between us and
them was impossible to bridge. People morphed into products of the environment – those
that gave you hope at fourteen had lost their ‘potential’ by seventeen. He echoed to me the
same words my father had once said, when you’re black, you do not get second chances.
Privilege was a concept he was extremely familiar with: his hustle to achieve college offers
had amounted to nothing. It did not matter, he could not pay his way through a 4 year
program. I saw him as a superhero, slashing through all the weeds in his path. His powers
meant nothing in a world where money and connections were given greater importance. His
work had not amounted to what he deserved: a bitter reminder of the cruel relentlessness of
nature’s give-and-take and the myth of meritocracy.

Three weeks into my sophomore year of high school. I hugged him for the last time.

A month later, all I had was anger and lasts.

Jayden Brown. Mistaken for the antithesis to who he was and he’s neither the first or last. In
their eyes, he was not someone who cried regularly at the film, Up, but the monolithic black
man. Unarmed but his skin colour was the only weapon they needed in order to launch the
offensive. My warnings about law enforcement had been innumerable, I had witnessed the
movement spread, there is an inconceivable dichotomy between the pursuers of justice and
their injustice. Three shots. With three shots, he no longer had a pulse or future. No
hesitation. No second chances. Just three taps on the trigger. His heterogeneity ignored,
they warped his soft brown eyes into images of immorality and aggression. Seizing his
liberties on the basis of presumptions and misguided bias, my hope in justice had been
relinquished. His Suppression, repression, further regression, is that what the black
experience is deemed to be? Is this what it means to be black? Left with condolences and
a corpse. The only person who invested his valuable time into the triviality of my life had
been stolen from me, deserting me with the memories of who he was in the past and who
he could have been. The aftermath of police brutality: kaleidoscopes of pain, anger,
devastation, emptiness, questioning the system. My agony became faded whispers,
shadows of my pain. I yearned for something other than numbness, rooted in confusion and
shock, perceptible in every neuron. I needed him. My shattered heart urged to feel a
semblance of emotion. Broken with a turbulently shaken worldview. He was gone.

When I am 20, they will say the names of those lost to police brutality, those lost to poverty,
those lost to our system which thrives on exclusion and marginalisation. He will not become
a statistic nor a memory in my brain nor a name you retweet to never acknowledge again.
Nor will they hide behind the misguided view that racism has been eradicated when
communities are still stuck in its slipstream. Quashing the myopic status quo we uphold
and confronting ever-persisting issues for a society which is not racist or colour-blind but
colour-brave: valiant enough to see race and destroy the institutions which function to
divide. Our unconscious biases will be relentlessly attacked, not deeply suppressed. We will
change the system.

Fairness is not a utopia.

The future I demand is simple: the ability to walk with the scales of justice balanced so the
presumption of innocence belongs to us all.

***

It would be remiss not to applaud the ambition of the author in presenting this story in this way. The concise way this piece is written made the reader leap straight into the action and want to keep reading to find out what happened next. This author has a firm grasp of one of the more tricky aspects of writing fiction; how the author can keep the reader interested, feeding tiny bits of information so that little by little the bigger picture unfolds. Kayo Chingonyi, Orwell Youth Prize Judge

‘What he left me with’ is a junior Orwell Youth Prize 2020 Runner Up, responding to the theme ‘The Future We Want’.

What was the inspiration behind your piece?

A draft of the piece was written before the reemergence of Black Lives Matter. However, after the deaths of George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery, the protests inspired me and led me to rewrite some elements of my piece. The protests highlighted the harrowing effects of police brutality, it hurts more than the victims.  The perspective of a loved one was chosen because they are often perspectives we fail to acknowledge. Police brutality is seen as an American issue but I feel like my final statement is applicable to Britain. For example, prejudice and injustice are evident in the disproportionate use of stop-and-search, exemplifying that we are not all presumed to be innocent.

What tip would you give other young writers?

My biggest tip to young writers is very cliched but it is true: read anything and everything. Reading is quite possibly the biggest asset to your writing. It enables you to see different perspectives and grow your vocabulary. As a child, I read often which allowed me to develop a further enjoyment for English. Reading fiction, non-fiction, newspapers all contribute to a greater worldview which is ultimately necessary when writing. Do not be afraid to explore the limits of your imagination!

Given the global pandemic, has your idea about the future you want changed since you wrote the piece?

The pandemic has changed quite a few of my ideas surrounding the future. After seeing how it has had a greater impact on people who live in poorer areas, it has made me realise how we need to keep pushing for social mobility and equality. Additionally, the effect of pollution on coronavirus only exemplifies how people living in deprived, polluted areas suffer disproportionately. There needs to be a more sustainable way of living. We should have capitalised on the pandemic to implement a greener way of living for future generations. Lastly, the pandemic has led people to the realisation that racism is still a problem. I hope people remain conscious of racism so we can work to change the societal structures which allow racism to persist.