Words Wednesday: George Orwell
Happy Words Wednesday! Today we’re featuring a George Orwell quote.
1984 by George Orwell
This George Orwell quote comes from his acclaimed novel 1984 (sometimes written as Nineteen Eighty-Four). Published in 1949, 1984 is a dystopian novel that explores life under a totalitarian government that controls everything and watches everyone.
“But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.”
-George Orwell quote from 1984
Orwell’s Legacy
It’s almost impossible to overestimate the lasting influence that 1984 has had on popular culture. Many common words were first introduced by Orwell in 1984, including doublespeak, thoughtcrime, telescreen, memory hole, and of course Big Brother. The author himself has even entered into the lexicon as the adjective “Orwellian,” though a great deal of debate exists over what this word really means (or should mean).
As many writers point out, Orwell has become a sort of calling card for both sides of the political spectrum, a fact that complicates his legacy. As Sam Jordison of The Guardian says:
“Many on the right think Orwell speaks for them and they speak for Orwell. Many on the left think the equal and opposite. Plenty in the middle feel the same. Orwell is rightly praised as a prophet, a teller of uncomfortable truths and a writer who has changed the way we see and talk about the world. But most of us read into him what we want to see. He may hold up a mirror to the world – but our own faces tend to get in the way.”
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