Monday, October 19, 2015

Yay! Some dissing of 1984

Goodbye to all that: Orwell's 1984 is a boot stamping on a human face no more

I've written before how much I disliked 1984 as a high school student, and yet felt compelled to write about it somewhat positively because of its near universal critical acclaim.

I think this academic's take on its mere transitory relevance as parable is just about right.  Why wasn't he around when I needed him in 1975?   

5 comments:

Not Trampis said...

1984 is an alltime great.

Shame on you!!

Steve said...

Actually, the age in which technology enables the universal surveillance envisaged in the book shows that the public, by and large, are willing participants in it. The Anti Sex League - ha! Orwell just seemed wacky on that, even as parable. [I think its fair to say that the Nazis had no great problem with sex, as long as it was between straight Aryans and helping weed out the weaker races.]

As the guy in the article argues, it makes partial sense as a parable of its day, but yeah, even by the 70's its lack of contemporary relevance was clear.

Steve said...

OK, probably someone reading is going to say that the universal surveillance was also not objected to by most of the public in the book - but people don't care about it because they like self exposure on social media, not because they are brainwashed that it is needed for State solidarity.

Steve said...

And come to think of it, someone will probably raise China's attempted control of social media. Meh. Still not convinced.

Not Trampis said...

when Orwell wrote the book he had no idea of what might occur in the future,
He did have vivid memories of both Hitler and more importantly Stalin and then project that into the future.

He did that brilliantly IMHO