I Just Reread George Orwell's '1984' and the Novel Is Scarier Than Ever

Fox News ^ | Michael Levin

[nopardons]

Far too young to read that book, no matter what reading level that child was on! At the age of 10, 11, or even 12, there is no way that ANY child is mentally prepared nor knowledgeable of enough history and politics to be able to comprehend 1984!

[cpdiii]

I read George Orwell’s 1984, 40 years ago and considered it great fiction and very entertaining. It was not fiction but simply a warning. I read it again recently and can see clearly his fiction has become reality.

Orwell went to Spain and fought for the communists. He was wounded oddly not by Franco’s troops but a rival communist faction. They did fight each other.

He returned to England and became socialist libertarian. He sadly died of TB. If he had of lived another 20 years I suspect he would have been a conservative libertarian.

He is a man to be honored.

[dayglored]

I don't know what "1984" the article's author read, but he's missed a critical thing:

"...In the novel, Big Brother’s regime has three main divisions -- the Ministry of Peace, which ironically wages the above-referenced constant war; the Ministry of Plenty, which oversees never-ending famine; and the Ministry of Love, which houses the government’s extensive torture apparatus..."

FOUR main divisions, yo. Ministry of Truth -- the very organ that Winston worked for. As was described in the novel:

The Ministry of Peace concerns itself with war, the Ministry of Truth with lies, the Ministry of Love with torture and the Ministry of Plenty with starvation. These contradictions are not accidental, nor do they result from ordinary hypocrisy: they are deliberate exercises in doublethink.

I first read 1984 in high school, and I've re-read it in whole at least a dozen times since then, and re-read parts to refresh my memory. It's one of perhaps five books that have most influenced my thinking and shaped my opinions and beliefs.

It'd be nice if article authors would take a bit more care.

Then again, I should just be pleased that 1984 is still available. I fully expect that it, Brave New World, Animal Farm, and the others, will disappear in the coming decade.

I'm 71 and may not live to see that terrifying time, but my daughter will, and I fear for her. Tough times, FRiends, tough times.

[AzNASCARfan]

I don’t think most people saw the same relevance of this book back in 1976 that we do now in hindsight, for a reading assignment then... which is sort of the same reason so many public school districts have removed it from their curriculum now. Seems to me, we all took it as more of something that would never happen in a million years at the time instead of a prediction of our real future.

I can tell you thinking back on my political leanings at the time, I don’t remember my parents or any adults talking politics, but I did listen to Paul Harvey with my dad a lot. In fifth grade, our class went and heard Ford and Carter speak on separate field trips to the civic auditorium... except Carter sent somebody else we never heard of to talk for him where Ford showed up himself and told us his vision for our country. I thought I knew the stakes then, I remember as sort of a first political memory, waking up and crying the morning after Carter won just knowing it was the beginning of the end of our country... I would have just turned 11 a few months before.

[Presbyterian Reporter]

“”””The book is by Anthony Burgess. Kubrick was pretty faithful in transferring it to film.””””

---

I learn something new every day. I thought A CLOCKWORK ORANGE was an original work by Kubrick.

[Pearls Before Swine]

The most demoralizing part of the book is the ending when Winston Smith’s will and spirit is crushed and the system, Big Brother, wins.

"What is in Room 101?"

"You know what is in Room 101, Winston. Everyone knows what is in Room 101. Your worst fears."

Sometimes it is something quite trivial. In your case, Winston, the worst thing is rats."

(quoted from memory, forgive inaccuracies)

Poor Winston. No wonder he was crushed.

[dadfly]

so was Winston—an atheist, that is.

in the novel, O’Brien asks him specifically under torture and Winston denies God. very telling.

[ro_dreaming]

We read it and then watched the movie with John Hurt in my English class in high school.

I rewatched it a few months ago - still chilling.

[nopardons]

Children ( teens, younger ones weren't exposed to this book or others of the same genre below 9th grade ) in the '50s and '60s, who went to public or private school and had good teachers, were taught that 1984 was a cautionary tale about what might come to pass, here, and had already taken place, in ways, in the USSR and other totalitarian run countries. i

I can't talk about other states; however, in grades 3-8, in ALL schools of EVERY kind, in N.Y.State, in the 1950's ( and probably long before that decade ), children had weekly CURRENT EVENTS lessons, which included American and world events and politics. So kids did know, by the time they got to high school, enough to understand what's in 1984 and yes, other such books.

The nightly news was something that most people watched, once there was T.V. and prior to that, people listened to news on the radio. And people read morning and afternoon newspaper. Then there were the newsreels that were shown in movie theatres, from the time of the early talkies through the early '60s at least.

Perhaps not all children/teens paid attention, by the time you were that age, but many did.