It was on this day in 1949 that George Orwell’s seminal work, Nineteen Eighty-Four, was first published.
Generations of readers have looked upon 1984 as a dystopian cautionary tale. However, with the elevation of Emperor Trump it feels more like a How To manual.
One doesn’t have to press too many buttons on the Googalizer Machine to find pundits comparing the current regime in the Oval Office with the events in the book. Here’s just a small sample:
Orwell’s “1984” and Trump’s America
Revisiting Orwell’s ‘1984’ in Trump’s America
How ‘1984’ can decode Trump’s first 100 days
Welcome to dystopia – George Orwell experts on Donald Trump
George Orwell’s ‘1984’ is a best-seller again. Here’s why it resonates now
1984 Isn’t the Only Book Enjoying a Revival
Orwell named the book by reversing the last 2 digits of the year in which it was written, giving the year 1984 a resonance it would not have had otherwise. According to the WikiWackyWoo, Nineteen Eighty-Four had been published in 65 different languages by 1989, more than any other English language book.
It’s also a book whose time has come, and gone, and come again.
Everything old is new again.