Nineteen Eighty-Four

Description

Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Novel, often referred to as 1984, is a dystopian social science fiction novel by the English novelist George Orwell (the pen name of Eric Arthur Blair). It was published on 8 June 1949 by Secker & Warburg as Orwell's ninth and final book completed in his lifetime. Thematically, Nineteen Eighty-Four centres on the consequences of totalitarianism, mass surveillance, and repressive regimentation of persons and behaviours within society. Orwell, himself a democratic socialist, modelled the authoritarian government in the novel after Stalinist Russia. More broadly, the novel examines the role of truth and facts within politics and the ways in which they are manipulated.

First Sentence

It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen

Description

1984 has come and gone, but George Orwell's prophetic, nightmarish vision in 1949 of the world we were becoming is timelier than ever. 1984 is still the great modern classic of "negative utopia" a startlingly original and haunting novel that creates an imaginary world that is convincing, from the first sentence to the last four words. 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. --back cover

Subjects

Other Editions

• Nineteen Eighty-FourMass Market PaperbackSignet Classics
• 1984PaperbackNew American Library of World Literature1950-01-01
• Nineteen Eighty-FourPenguin Publishing Group1960-01-01
• 1984N A L1983-01-01
• 1984Den Norske Bokklubben1983-01-01
• Nineteen eighty-fourSecker & Warburg1984-01-01