Louis Proyect wrote: > We never were told that "1984? was written as an attack on all forms of > monolithic societies, including the Cold War anticommunist west. It was > strictly a warning about the dangers of Communism. "big brother was watching > you" was only about the GPU, not the FBI. To become an "Unperson" was > something that happened to Soviet dissidents, not the Hollywood 10, etc.
I think it's also about the war fever that Orwell encountered during WW2 in England, including the propagandistic attitudes and newspeak-type jargon among the bureaucrats. According to the Wikipedia: >In 1941, Orwell worked for BBC's Eastern Service, supervising Indian >broadcasts meant to stimulate India's war participation against the >approaching Japanese army. About being a propagandist, he wrote of feeling >like "an orange that's been trodden on by a very dirty boot". ... the war-time >Ministry of Information, at Senate House, University of London, inspired the >Ministry of Truth in the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. >Orwell's BBC resignation followed a report confirming his fears about the >broadcasts: few Indians listened. He wanted to become a war correspondent.... >Despite the good salary, he resigned from BBC in September 1943, and in >November became literary editor of the left-wing weekly magazine Tribune ...< BTW, it's Winston _Smith_. -- Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
