Why Orwell Wrote 1984
George Orwell was asked by one Noel Willmett whether he really believed a 1984 like scenario was possible. Orwell’s reply ( via a letter ) is illuminating. Keep in mind that he wrote this letter in 1944, while World War II was still going on. Orwell feared the rising cult of leader-worship (Hitler, Stalin, Franco and de Gaulle). Taken to an extreme, he feared this resulted in “a tendency to disbelieve in the existence of objective truth because all the facts have to fit in with the words and prophecies of some infallible fuhrer.” (Orwell even mentions Gandhi on his list! Which isn’t as ridiculous as it sounds as first. After all, Gandhi had quaint ideas on the role of villages in economic growth. And while he didn’t wield a machine gun to enforce his view, he did influence post-independent India’s stance on the topic, didn’t he?) Orwell argued that neither Britain nor the US should be too smug on this leader-worship topic because, he argued: “Britain and the USA ha...