There’s a rumour that George Orwell wrote his famous work 1984 based on 1,984 testimonies of experiences during the Wars. He looked at archive newspaper clippings, statements, and eyewitness accounts wherever he could find them. He put these together to sum up the feelings of the day, and to epitomise the thinking of the people around him.
His novel is a cultural work, or an artifice (as one writer described it to me) for our nation. It’s understood in our deepest, innermost thoughts and feelings. It’s believed by some that more book groups exist around this work by Orwell than any by Tolkien or similar writers.
It hits deep, and yet it hits where it hurts for many people. The themes and images evoke something of the reality of today. It’s the enduring power of a political work. It’s not just a tale told by a Journalists eye, but it has some veracity to it because it sympathises with us. It takes on our horrors and interprets the ghouls and shadows into more.
