Empire Files (2/1/17)

Their are very few literary masterpieces that can transcend generations. There are even fewer that serve as a blueprint for the future. One of those books is 1984, one of the most prolific novels of our time. The author was born Eric Arthur Blair, but was probably most know by his pen name, George Orwell. George Orwell was one of the greatest visionaries of the twentieth century who identified himself as a democratic socialist. Under the Soviet Union he was forced to flee under communism suppression of socialist dissidents.

War is Peace

Slavery is Freedom

Ignorance is Strength

In 1945 he wrote Animal Farm, a novel anthropomorphizing the animal kingdom, meant to serve as a metaphor for Stalin’s betrayal of the Russian Revolution. Soon after, Orwell wrote his most famous book of all time, 1984, which portrayed a terrifying future of a total surveillance and police state. Tragically, just one year after it published, Orwell died of tuberculosis at the unforgivably young age of 46.

Nineteen Eighty-Four, often published as 1984, is, in summary, a dystopian novel, set in Airstrip One (formerly known as Great Britain), a province of the superstate Oceania in a world of perpetual war, omnipresent government surveillance, and public manipulation. The superstate and its residents are dictated to by a political regime euphemistically named English Socialism, shortened to “Ingsoc” in Newspeak, the government’s invented language. The superstate is under the control of the privileged elite of the Inner Party, a party and government that persecutes individualism and independent thinking as “thoughtcrime”, which is enforced by the “Thought Police”.

The tyranny is ostensibly overseen by Big Brother, the Party leader who enjoys an intense cult of personality, but who may not even exist. The Party “seeks power entirely for its own sake. It is not interested in the good of others; it is interested solely in power.” The protagonist of the novel, Winston Smith, is a member of the Outer Party, who works for the Ministry of Truth (or Minitrue in Newspeak), which is responsible for propaganda and historical revisionism. His job is to rewrite past newspaper articles, so that the historical record always supports the party line.

Link to Story and 7-Minute Video

 

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VIDEO: Full Version Of The 1956 Version Of George Orwell’s ‘1984’

Nineteen Eighty-Four (mostly written 1984) is a 1948 dystopian fiction written by George Orwell (Eric Arthur Blair), about a society ruled by an oligarchical dictatorship. The Oceanian province of Airstrip One is a world of perpetual war, pervasive government surveillance, and incessant public mind control. Oceania is ruled by a political party called simply The Party. The individual is always
subordinated to the state, and it is in part this philosophy which allows the Party to manipulate and control humanity. In the Ministry of Truth, protagonist Winston Smith is a civil servant responsible for perpetuating the Party’s propaganda by revising historical records to render the Party omniscient and always correct, yet his meager existence disillusions him to the point of seeking rebellion against Big Brother.

Many people often draw parallels between our modern reality and Orwell’s vision.

Link to 1-Hour, 30-Minute Video

 

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EXCELLENT VIDEO: George Orwell: A Life in Pictures Full Documentary 

“I was both a snob and a revolutionary.”

BBC (12/27/17)

George Orwell: A Life in Pictures is a 2003 BBC Television docudrama telling the life story of the British author George Orwell. Chris Langham plays the part of Orwell. No surviving sound recordings or video of the real George Orwell have been found.

Link to 1-Hour, 28-Minute Video

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A Final Warning from George Orwell…

From BBC Documentary “A Life In Pictures”: 2-Minute Video

(Commoner Call cartoon by Mark L. Taylor, 2017. Open source and free to use with link to www.thecommonercall.org )