George Orwell book sold for $128,000

The first edition of a George Orwell book signed by the author has fetched 86,000 pounds ($128,000) at an auction.

The 1930s edition of the semi-autobiographical novel Down and Out in Paris and London was impeccably preserved, and still had its dust cover, a spokesman for the Lewes auction house said.

The book, which contains a dedication to Orwell's agent dated Christmas Eve 1932, was expected to bring in a maximum of 3,500 pounds.

Full report here Hindustan Times

According to a poll conducted by BBC, George Orwell's 1984 and Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace are among the books people are most likely to have lied about reading. Four in 10 respondents (42%) pretending to have read it Orwell's nove, while a third (31%) said they had lied about reading War and Peace.

Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children came in at seventh place, with 14% admitting to lying about having read it.

A total of 1,342 people took part in the online survey in January and February this year. The survey released to mark World Book Day. Visitors to the World Book Day website were given a list of 10 books and asked which they had lied about reading.