Ironically (or not) I think I might’ve read it IN 1984. In high school a few years later I read it again. Still really powerful. I’m going to buy the audible version when my next credit arrives.
An interesting interview with Margaret Atwood where she says that the rule she had writing THMT is that nothing goes in the book that doesn't have a historical precedent, makes the distinction between speculative fiction and science fiction, and compares with 1984 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljvVUW2vrRU
I think ‘technically’ it was always non fiction. Orwell wrote it as a commentary on life in England in 1948. The Ministry of Truth was the BBC. He was a mystic 😉
Banned in FL school libraries along w/ Anne Franks' Diary, Slaughterhouse Five, etc. I shouldn't pick on FL; other states did it also. Education is not a priority in the public schools under this regime. 'The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows' ~ Sydney J. Harris
It has been in the making since the end of WWII, the people who have been in power forging ahead with their plan for decades. Remember where a bunch of foreign interference is coming from and why they want what they are after. Decades to them is a short period of time in history.
Having been in educational publishing the majority of my career, I’m strongly opposed to book banning. In Oklahoma where I live, a radical christian nationalist state school superintendant is ordering all state schools to use dictated prayer and curriculum using the Trump bible. Horrifying.
Well you should have seen the leader of the conservative party at Spain mentioning "that book written in 1984"... criticizing government with lies, and not knowing that Orwell actually fought in our civil war against them. George knew.
I’ve been wondering about all the dystopian books I’ve read and/or taught and what it will feel like to be living through some of these governments in real life. :(
I dedicate a chapter in my latest fake news book (published by Routledge) to fiction - and you won't be surprised to know that a consideration of 1984 opens the entire introduction to the book itself.
The Outer Party had most to fear - they were the ones who were most tightly controlled, because they possessed enough information to see Big Brother as a threat. For the proles is largrly sufficed to keep them in ignorance and occasionally blow a few of them up and blame it on a foreign aggressor.
I used to work in Barnes and Noble and every year we'd carry banned books. Teachers would still assign them and kids would come in and buy them. Some teachers would buy them for their kids and have the kids buy the books from them. We did really well with them as a company. F the fascists.
There is a free online .txt version. Use notepad++ to change 1/3 of telescreen into 'computer', 1/3 into 'laptop' and 1/3 into 'phone'.
Welcome. You're now reading 2024. While living in it.
I wish it was not as accurate a prediction as it has been. Fortunately, we still have time to diverge from that reality, we just need to make a united effort to do so.
Comments
And Idiocracy is a documentary now.
Also, "Idiocracy" should be re-classified as a documentary.
Maybe there should be.
The Republicans that orchestrated all this have been playing the long game.
The long term decline in education standards has been deliberate.
They created a largely uneducated population that could be easily manipulated.
And bingo.
They need to change it from a comedy to a documentary
Welcome. You're now reading 2024. While living in it.