Burmese Days - The waning days of British imperialism

Orwell is best known for fabulist classics like Animal Farm and 1984, but his realist work has been unfairly overlooked. Down and Out in Paris and London, for example, provides great narrative reportage about lower-working-class Europe, but what really stands out for me is Burmese Days, his fictional account of colonial life in Southeast Asia. Few books so dramatically capture the tenuousness of cross-cultural (and male-female) interaction in an overseas setting.