George Orwell (1903-1950)

Eric Arthur Blair was an English novelist, poet, essayist, journalist, and critic who wrote under the pen name of George Orwell. His work is characterised by lucid prose, social criticism, opposition to all totalitarianism, and support of democratic socialism.

Quotes

On the whole human beings want to be good, but not too good, and not quite all the time.
In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.
If you want to imagine the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face forever.
It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.
If people cannot write well, they cannot think well, and if they cannot think well, others will do their thinking for them.
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
War is Peace
Freedom is Slavery
Ignorance is Strength
From the totalitarian point of view, history is something to be created rather than learned.
Freedom is the right to say two plus two make four. If granted, all else follows.
Being in a minority, even a minority of one, did not make you mad.
Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood.
In general, the greater the understanding, the greater the delusion: the more intelligent, the less sane.
One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish a dictatorship.
The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power.
What you say or do doesn't matter: only feelings matter.
They can make you say anything - ANYTHING - but they can't make you believe it.
Orthodoxy means not thinking - not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness.
The war is not meant to be won, it is meant to be continuous. Hierarchical society is only possible on the basis of poverty and ignorance. This new version is the past and no different past can ever have existed. In principle the war effort is always planned to keep society on the brink of starvation. The war is waged by the ruling group against its own subjects and its object is not the victory over either Eurasia or East Asia, but to keep the very structure of society intact.
No doubt alcohol, tobacco, and so forth, are things that a saint must avoid, but sainthood is a thing that human beings must avoid.
Orthodoxy means not thinking--not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness.

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