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1984 by George Orwell
MLCWO Rating: 5/5
Opinion: An eye-opening masterpiece which will chill you to the bone.
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Summary
“Winston Smith toes the Party line, rewriting history to satisfy the demands of the Ministry of Truth. With each lie he writes, Winston grows to hate the Party that seeks power for its own sake and persecutes those who dare to commit thoughtcrimes. But as he starts to think for himself, Winston can’t escape the fact that Big Brother is always watching…
A startling and haunting novel, 1984 creates an imaginary world that is completely convincing from start to finish. No one can deny the novel’s hold on the imaginations of whole generations, or the power of its admonitions—a power that seems to grow, not lessen, with the passage of time.”
-From Amazon.com
Review
With the amount of school work I’ve been struggling to get through recently I have had zero interest in reading but this book has been at the back of my mind for ages. So, 1 week ago I decided to give it a go and holy cow was it a wild ride!
An analysis of our present.
Honestly, this book was terrifying to read. It was kind of like look at the current state of affairs in the 21st century with the claims of Fake News, false videos being shared as true documentation of events and events being rewritten as those who remember it die out (i.e. denying the Holocaust). While this book is called 1984 and references a past time, it is still completely timeless and just translates to any period. In the United States, following the 2016 election, this book had a sudden spike in popularity bringing back the ideas of Big Brother and a government attempting to skew the information to fit their narrative.
Technology is always listening in, with our famous Alexa’s, Google Homes and Siri being around for our beck and call. The devices within 1984 were incredibly similar to what everyone so willingly invites into their homes – except these devices were known to always watch and listen. The New York Times wrote an incredible post about why Why ‘1984’ Is a 2017 Must-Read and it still certainly applies.
A reality check of what could happen.
While it does have a scary number of parallels to what is happening now, this book puts everything in the extreme. To me this is an incredibly important read for people to understand what could happen. You’re probably thinking ‘but oh no, the government would never re-write history or that would never-ever happen’. No one wants to think it will happen until one day we wake up and our freedoms are taken away – we do this by inviting devices into our homes that aren’t secure that people can hack into.
While I don’t believe it will ever come to this because there are enough people who are aware of the dangers, that may not be enough. As the book liked to point out, it doesn’t necessarily matter who is fighting against it because those in power always can silence them. But on the flip side, you can kill people but you can never kill an idea.
It had it all: secrecy, revolt, love and violence/passion.
I say violence/passion because in a way the book makes those two interchangeable. But it had lots of secrecy with you wondering who would be caught when, revolt against the ‘powers that be’ being Big Brother. It had love – or probably more accurately lust. Yes, there were some adult romance themes but nothing too rude because this is an older book and those kind of things aren’t anything like they are in 21st century books. All the sex in this book was necessary to the story and the world that these characters lived in and really made the book even more raw.
Overall, it’s an eye-opening masterpiece which will chill you to the bone.
This is one of those books that I think will stick with you – like Fahrenheit 451 did. This book is such a wonderful read, not difficult but really gets you thinking. My dreams were super crazy after reading this at bed time but I adored it! I highly recommend this book to everyone because not only is it an eye-opener, but it’s a classic and certainly a conversation piece.
Happy Reading!
Book Information:
Paperback: 328 Pages
Language: English
ISBN-10: 9780451524935
ISBN-13: 978-0451524935
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