“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen” begynder som bekendt Orwells Nineteen Eighty-Four. I The Ministry of Truth, Dorian Lynskeys nyligt udkomne studie af bogen, dens inspirationskilder og dens indflydelse, nævnes et sted i forbifarten at det faktisk er den sjette af Orwells bøger der indledes med en klokkeslætsangivelse. Jeg har læst alle Orwells romaner, samt de selvbiografiske skriverier i boglængde, men det var ikke noget jeg havde lagt mærke til, så det blev jeg lige nødt til at konstatere ved selvsyn. Den er god nok: af de seks romaner Orwell skrev, er det kun Animal Farm der nøjes med en mindre specifik tidsangivelse (“Mr Jones, of the Manor Farm, had locked the hen-houses for the night, but was too drunk to remember to shut the pop-holes”). Her er de øvrige, hhv Burmese Days, A Clergyman’s Daughter, Coming up for Air og Keep the Aspidistra Flying:
U Po Kyin, Sub-divisional Magistrate of Kyauktada, in Upper Burma, was sitting in his veranda. It was only half past eight, but the month was April, and there was a closeness in the air, a threat of the long, stifling midday hours.
As the alarm clock on the chest of drawers exploded like a horrid little bomb of bell metal, Dorothy, wrenched from the depths of some complex, troubling dream, awoke with a start and lay on her back looking into the darkness in extreme exhaustion. […] It was just half past five, and coldish for an August morning.
The idea really came to me the day I got my new false teeth.
I remember the morning well. At about a quarter to eight I’d nipped out of bed and got into the bathroom just in time to shut the kids out.
The clock struck half past two. In the little office at the back of Mr McKechnie’s bookshop, Gordon – Gordon Comstock, last memeber of the Comstock family, aged twenty-nine and rather moth-eaten already – lounged across the table, pushing a four-penny packet of Player’s Weights open and shut with his thumb.
Og endelig den selvbiografiske Down and Out in Paris and London:
The Rue du Coq d’Or, Paris, seven in the morning. A succession of furious, choking yells from the street.
Hvis det ikke var fordi jeg ejer romanerne samlet i ét bind, (The Penguin Complete Novels of George Orwell som i øvrigt spøjst nok ordner titlerne alfabetisk snarere end efter udgivelsesår), ville jeg naturligvis straks arrangere bøgerne på hylden efter klokkeslæt, bare for at sætte en ære i denne unikke mulighed for at nørde igennem!
TL, DR:
05:30 – A Clergyman’s Daughter
07:00 – Down and Out in Paris and London
07.45 – Coming up for Air
08:30 – Burmese Days
13:00 – Nineteen Eighty-Four
14:30 – Keep the Aspidistra Flying