1984

Rating:
Summary: Wow, so true to life.....Love this Book!
Review: I read this book in High School and once more since then. Ive also seen the movie which is very well done, almost exactly like the book.... Everyone here says its prophetic and that it is still in the future...is it? or has 1984 been with us well before the actual 1984? Anyways when I read it in High School I got most of it, but some of it went over my head...untill I entered the working world/college and the ranks or society with all the expectations that go along with these situations and experiences....Now it mirrors everyday life....I already distrust the government and most authority figures, religious and non religious. I dont believe in their wars...even after the WTC attacks...and I really dont believe in thier advertising and or media.....If you want a book that will change your outlook and open your eyes and show you the truth of the present and past plus a warning about the possibilities of a future traveling the wrong path...read this! not because I told you to...but because you need to know :)

Rating:
Summary: the best book ever written
Review: There are things .which can be felt but can`t be explained . This book is one of them . If you haven`t read it yet , read it and if you`ve read it , read it once again and then one more time , one more time . Then you`ll see that Orwell`s prediction is everywhere in our lives . i HOPE you`ll see it and if you see it once , you won`t be able to throw it away from your mind !
if you`re brave enough , read it and CHANGE it .
PS: big brother was everything in the book . There wouldn`t be anything without him . Like the God in our lives . We want to play "the god" and "big brother" (the society) so we create games from book ..
I think this book has more things than orwell wanted to say ..

Rating:
Summary: One of the scariest books you'll ever read
Review: To sum it up, this book scared me to death. No, there are no monsters, serial killers, or anything else like that. 1984 is about an extreme communist society and how one man tries to break free from it. The book may seem like a bit of a love story, but that's not the point. The frightening thing about this book is that our hero fails. With most books, the hero is triumphant at the end, or at least there is a glimmer of hope. Not with this book. Our hero, Winston, falls in love with Julia and together they want to break free from the hell they live in. But they are caught, tortured, and eventually betray each other. Since they have betrayed each other (something they thought they would never do), they no longer love each other. The idea that a society can make you stop loving somebody and change who you are in a realistic manner is frightening. This book had me paranoid for about a week. Even still, not all lessons are happy and this book is well worth the paranoia you might feel because of the lesson it gives you. Although this book was written in the 1940's, it is still hauntingly relevant today.

Rating:
Summary: a concentrated narrative . . .
Review: 1984 is a lovely book. In it we find bland descriptions choreographed with a rhythmic, powerful force of language and an internalized graphic depiction of a mind on the brink of rebellion.

It is false to claim that this is a 'probable future', as many of the issues and threats of the time of the prophecy have come and gone and been resolved by the evolution of society. But the meaning is lasting, regardless of your meaning of oppression.

There tends to come a time in life when everyone feels oppressed, trapped by the state of the world and angered over their perceived restrictions. In the case of this novel the specifics of the dictatorship are agonizingly detailed, the interest maintained by Orewell's natural story-telling abilities and spectacular wit. But the meaning is meant to go deeper, filtering away the extremist exaggeration of the satirist and searching for clues in the muck of human nature.

These issues are timeless and therefore the threat of 1984 will never likely go away. There will always be either a real or perceived oppressor and there will always be a basic human instinct to rebell. Nowhere is this principle more lucidly articulated than in 1984.

Rating:
Summary: Depressing, but enlightening.
Review: As an American, I enjoy freedoms that are alien to the majority of the world. If this had any effect on my life, it made me appreciate where and how I live my life. The book itself was very well written and entertaining. The beginning of the book was depressing to the point where I didn't want to read it, but as I progressed, I started to enjoy it. It was very difficult to emphasize with Winston because I cannot imagine the world he lives in. As I reflect on the book as a whole, I realize that it was more than worth my time to read. Every person who reads this book gets something different out of it, but I can guarentee if you read with interest you will get something out of it.

Rating:
Summary: A prophetic nightmare
Review: One year before his death in 1950, George Orwell published a book entitled 1984. Since that time, 1984 has gone to become one of the most important books ever written. 1984's main character is Winston Smith, a man who doubts the righteousness of the totalitarian government (Big Brother) that rules Oceania, one of three superstates in the world of 1984. We begin the book with Winston, and learn that Big Brother is quite fictional. The government has developed its own language, is at constant war with the other two superstates, and watches its citizens at all times. As Winston's rebellion progresses, we notice that Big Brother is not as unrealistic as we think. One of the books more prophetic elements is Big Brothers use of "Newspeak" to control the masses: Newspeak is the official language of Oceania, and has its sole purpose in abolishing all unorthodox thought. "Newspeak" is used to today in the form of "Politically Correct".

The reader also comes across the metaphysical philosophy behind 1984. Orwell brings terror into the story when he shows us what is really behind Big Brother; Oceania's government sends a representative into the plot. A government not unlike the one we think represents freedom, is at the head of Oceania, and that is where the stark reality of 1984 becomes evident: the sole manipulative technique used by Big Brother is one that is virtually unrecognizable-mental manipulation. Indeed, in a world where the so-called "war on terrorism" will be an excuse to establish a global police state, the warning of 1984 begins to resonate louder and louder. Read and learn.

Rating:
Summary: Fine book to read
Review: Even if some people disagree with me, I will say this is one of the best books you can read. Everyone must read this book, it has the power to change your beliefs about the world.

1984 goes deep to show you what the world COULD be like if a ruling party did all the right things to gain complete control over the populace. Your daily life monitored continuously, no rights to show individuality or freedom of speech, and constant fear of being whiped clean off the world if you did anything not in accordance with the Party, also known as Big Brother.
I sure hope something like this doesn't happen to us any time soon, not until I build my rocket ship to go to Mars and live in a cave.

I would certainly recommend this book to you, for only 300 pages it is some good reading.

Rating:
Summary: Amazing, gut-wrenching, and horrifyingly prophetic prose
Review: I read George Orwell's classic 1984 in High School, as a summer reading project. I still have that dog-eared and worn book sitting somewhere in my library, and I refer to it or quote from it quite often. It is haunting and horrifying. I both love it and hate it; in many ways, I believe that is the reaction Orwell wanted a reader to have when he or she put down the book, having read those four, final words (for those who've read the book, and understand it, you know exactly what I mean). I remember asking a friend of mine in that high school what books she had read for the summer. 1984 was on her list as well, and she hated it: she claimed it was depressing, that it was too dark, too dismal. That she didn't think it could happen. To that idea, and to others who would argue the same thing, I say that it is SUPPOSED to be dark, and depressing, and dismal. It is supposed to horrify you, to grab you and tear you from one revelation to the next, and to finally make you realize, through the conversion of the most average man in the world (Winston Smith, the protaganist), that any person in the world can be made into a machine, and learn to love it.(...)

One can walk away from this book with many different feelings on it: Orwell's predictions and fears leave a reader with so many ways of interpreting his prose. One can, and should, be horrified and sick to one's stomach at Smith's surrender to blissful ignorance. Personal freedom and thought, sex, love, honor, and hope are all crushed beneath a government that wants to reduce humanity to worker ants. The Party promises a future in the image of a boot stamping on a human face for all eternity. Reading this book, one immedietly begins to look upon the rest of the world, and begins to see how dangerously close to Orwell's fears humanity has come.

Wonderfully written, with incredible complexity (he did, after all, make up his very own language--NEWSPEAK-- to prove his points), and full of imagery that only furthers the sense of hopelessness and hollowness that makes up the theme of the book, this book is simply incredible. Love it. Hate it. Fear it. Read it. It is, without question, one of the great classics of the 20th Century.

Rating:
Summary: FIVE STARS ! ! ! !
Review: 1984 is an awesome book! It changed my life. It will change yours.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent -- Good Companion to Solzhenitsyn
Review: An excellent book. Fast reading and riveting, though certainly not pleasant. In its depiction of what could happen to our societies if the Liberals/Socialist/Communists take power, it's like an extension of Solzhenitysn's "Gulag Archipelago."