This novel is a sharp critique of the "money god" and the stifling commercialism that strangles individual creativity. Through Gordon Comstock, a protagonist who rejects the comforts of a middle-class life, Orwell explores the friction between artistic integrity and the relentless pressure of financial necessity. The ubiquitous Aspidistra plant becomes a satiric symbol for the dull, bourgeois ambitions that modern society makes almost impossible to escape.