1984

George Orwell

Sep 2013 · Sold by HarperCollins

About this ebook

75th ANNIVERSARY EDITION

“Orwell saw, to his credit, that the act of falsifying reality is only secondarily a way of changing perceptions. It is, above all, a way of asserting power.”—The New Yorker

In 1984, London is a grim city in the totalitarian state of Oceania where Big Brother is always watching you and the Thought Police can practically read your mind. Winston Smith is a man in grave danger for the simple reason that his memory still functions. Drawn into a forbidden love affair, Winston finds the courage to join a secret revolutionary organization called The Brotherhood, dedicated to the destruction of the Party. Together with his beloved Julia, he hazards his life in a deadly match against the powers that be.

Lionel Trilling said of Orwell’s masterpiece, “1984 is a profound, terrifying, and wholly fascinating book. It is a fantasy of the political future, and like any such fantasy, serves its author as a magnifying device for an examination of the present.” Though the year 1984 now exists in the past, Orwell’s novel remains an urgent call for the individual willing to speak truth to power.

Ratings and reviews

Big Brother and Thought Police may have been original back in 1950. Now it's a tired narrative of a sexually frustrated, controlled, middle aged government worker having loveless affairs and using toothless old prostitutes, just to get back at the maddening oppression of their government. Use your time instead to read about real accounts of what's going on with political prisoners in Iran, China, and North Korea. Or read daily news. The main character is very unlikable, not sympathetic to others under the same control and indoctrination of the party. Especially toward women, because they're raised that sexuality is dirty.

Interesting in the sense that it had a lot of similarities to the time that we live in now because of Trump. And maybe this is just the "prole" in me talking, but for the most part I thought it was pretty boring. Lots of talking about theory, and internal monologues, and explanations on why the world was so bad during that time, and not a lot of action. Also, I'm pretty sure the inclusions of the lengthy parts of Goldstein's book actually put me to sleep. I'm still glad I read it though.

With reference to when this book was written, the book's setting and events are like watching Back to the Future 2. The author predicted that someone would be spying on everyone, that some agency would edit news stories, and there would be endless war. The details of how this all goes down may be laughable today, but I still get creeped out thinking about how there may be some truth to what was written here. This book has influenced many authors, so you should read it.

About the author

George Orwell (1903–1950), the pen name of Eric Arthur Blair, was an English novelist, essayist, and critic. He was born in India and educated at Eton. After service with the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, he returned to Europe to earn his living by writing. An author and journalist, Orwell was one of the most prominent and influential figures in twentieth-century literature. His unique political allegory Animal Farm was published in 1945, and it was this novel, together with the dystopia of 1984 (1949), which brought him worldwide fame.