1984

Rating:
Summary: Tells the truth...
Review: Throughout history one stumbles upon a book that really knocks the senses into you. Millions upon millions of books have been written throughout the world's history, but few have made people think hard and carefully about life, politics, and philosophy. George Orwell's book is one of those few books. A more extensive fictional "treatise" on how a leftist state/society can go wrong than his much shorter "Animal Farm". It is about time that left-leaning people recognize what left-leaning systems really are: dictatorial and hypocritical. Orwell does a fine job in this book by showing how a state that is supposed to breakdown inequality and oppression actually turns out to be a state that supports inequality and oppression (in a more sinister way than rightist authoritarianisms--at least right wing states tell you outrightly that there will be inequality and are more honest with its people). He shows how a state can conjure up an image of a fictional leader (or project grandiose images of a real leader) to uphold the system. This is a book that all political science students should read.

Rating:
Summary: A different percetion of reality.
Review: personally i beleive every individual percieves reality differently from that of another; according to how society perceves them. Here Mr. Orwell clearly provides the ideologies of one man and how it relates to others/it's society. in all actuality no one is right nor wrong, they simply comply or not to that of one persons individualistical thought which has spread-out. "I.E. is censorship ok in our society?"

Rating:
Summary: I'll take a pint, not a liter
Review: A must-read. The one paragraph description of the High, the Middle, and the Low is worth the price of the book and the time to read it.

Carry on, Winston.

Rating:
Summary: No Comparison
Review: If you read one book in your life this one should be it. I read this back in the 7th grade(I am in college now) and I cannot say how much I appreciated this book. From the expansive sci-fi in it to the vocabulary words to represent the society... this is a work of art.

If you haven't read this book... read it. If you have read this book, then read it again.

Rating:
Summary: A must-read for every reader
Review: I first read this book in high school but never really appreciated it till just recently. With the passage of the Homeland Security Bill, I thought I'd better refresh my memory of this book. And this book is scarier than any Stephen King book ~~ it's scary because our future has arrived. With Big Brother watching our every move ...

The book is a reflection upon past times as well as the future ~~ it's a history of mankind. It is about power. It is about control ~~ one man over another. It is about power through total submission ~~ submersion of the self. It is not about the greater good of life or mankind. It is man at its very worst. Orwell took a deep look into despair and wrote bluntly about it. The surface of it is Big Brother watching every move you make ~~ till you get into the book and realize there is much more at sake. And it's so well-written. No matter that I wanted to put the book down and ignore it, I couldn't. I had to read it to the last page. And it's the scariest book I have ever read.

1-9-03

Rating:
Summary: Doubleplusgood, also doubleplusungood
Review: If you want to know what the title of this review means, you really do need to read the book. A technical translation is "very very good" and "very very bad", but that is inexact.

It is difficult to review this book without making comparisons to current events or using the word "prophetic". It is a world where all freedoms have been eliminated in favor of the bureaucratic order. It is totalitarian, as occasionally one or two people wake up to this fact. There is only one crime, to think bad thoughts, and the main character is guilty, because he remembers the unofficial (and therefore non-existant) version of the past.

What is most interesting about the book is how, in the end, they completely warped the thoughts of the protaganist so that he goes from wanting to rebel against the government to the last line of the book "Winston loved Big Brother."

That a government could progress to the point where it could twist a person's thoughts is frightening. That people can read this book and compare it to any modern government is revealing.

Yes, this book is all the things people say it is, which is why it should be read.

Rating:
Summary: this review...its not here. it never was
Review: why? read the book...
i dont exist

Rating:
Summary: TEACHERS??
Review: I was so upset to learn that this is no longer required reading in advanced English in high school. I ordered it for my son, because no one can be considered well read without this in one's history.

Rating:
Summary: Thought-provoking
Review: If you have not read this, I strongly recommend it ... ESPECIALLY if you are like me, and somehow "escaped" having this assigned to you either in high school or in college, but have always wondered what the hype was all about.

Too many times today, you will hear this book discarded as a bunch of prophesies that were way off -- e.g., that in the year 1984 there would be computers and "telescreens" that would all but read our minds; that "Big Brother" would always be watching us. Many, I'm sure, feel that since this is NOT the case today, that Orwell and his book were / are a wast of time.

As for me, the more I read this, the more I see how the overall concept of "Big Brother" -- i.e., how information is "cleansed" to "protect" us; how we are teaching technology itself to out-smart, or at least, stay one step ahead of us -- IS, in fact, all-too-real in our lives today!

In any case, very intriguing!

Rating:
Summary: Reality Check
Review: If you're buying this book and you don't know much about it then you're in for a trip down a pretty disturbing road. The obvious questions it raises about society, government, control, power, unity, trust, and faith in the human character might leave you thinking critically about humanity's direction (if you haven't before). Ultimately I felt like the book's strongest point was it's exploration of what "reality" becomes when manipulated by the mind's interpretation of it. But I think people's reactions to 1984 will vary according to their own insight into the books topics, especially within the political realm. Without a doubt, a great book.