Orwell

[Dr Jekyll]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-28971276

Will Self is criticising George Orwell's writing! Moreover, either he is criticising it precisely because he disapproves of clarity, or Will is writing so badly that I'm misunderstanding his argument.

[SV8Predator]

Thanks for posting.

I have never read such self-aggrandising (and I honestly don't mean that as a pun!), flowery-written tripe in a long time.

Who will be the more well-known in another fifty years? Orwell or Self? In fact, I shouldn't really be putting the two names in the same sentence.

As Orwell is a pen name, I also presume that "Self" is, and we can easily understand why this chap has chosen such.

Edited by SV8Predator on Sunday 31st August 20:59

[TheRealFingers99]

I rather like this bit: "Any insistence on a particular way of stating things is an ideological act, whether performed by George Orwell or the Ministry of Truth."

[paranoid airbag]

I don't know who will self is, but 1984 was boring to read, and its importance as a "predictor" book is vastly overstated. Whether that's his fault, or that of people decreeing any govt restriction whatsoever as "Orwellian" and diluting the phrase, I don't know - but it gets the narrative of the impact of technology on power structures in the 20th century almost completely wrong. Far better dystopias out there.

Animal farm's alright though, for 14 year olds at any rate.

[Dr Jekyll]

paranoid airbag said:

I don't know who will self is, but 1984 was boring to read, and its importance as a "predictor" book is vastly overstated. Whether that's his fault, or that of people decreeing any govt restriction whatsoever as "Orwellian" and diluting the phrase, I don't know - but it gets the narrative of the impact of technology on power structures in the 20th century almost completely wrong. Far better dystopias out there.

Animal farm's alright though, for 14 year olds at any rate.

1984 certainly isn't his best written book, it was dashed off in a few months while he was ill and it shows. It was never meant to be technologically predictive, just taking authoritarian trends and techniques to their logical conclusion. Somebody (Anthony Burgess?) reckoned it was actually a satire on 1948, this was treated was derision but I think there may be a grain of truth in it.

If you want to know why Orwell is well regarded as a writer, read his essays.

[carinaman]

Nice to see a comment here about it.

I heard on Radio 4 twice:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04fchmd

'Dog whistle' I've only heard before in relation to UKIP and immigration.

[leglessAlex]

Dr Jekyll said:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-28971276

Will Self is criticising George Orwell's writing! Moreover, either he is criticising it precisely because he disapproves of clarity, or Will is writing so badly that I'm misunderstanding his argument.

I understood it to be him criticising how Orwell was totally focused on saying things in a simple way and being very against using complex language. I somewhat agree with him, simple language is a good thing in many cases but it's nice to have the option to use complex language if we so wish. For instance, he quotes Orwell's 'rules for writing' which I disagree with, I often enjoy reading things that are written in more complex language not least because I feel like I'm learning new words and ways of describing things.

So yeah, I saw it more as Self disagreeing with those that think all writing should follow Orwell's rules.

I enjoyed reading the piece anyway, but it was extra satisfying to know that it was pissing off lots of people

[carinaman]

I wonder where 1984 and Newspeak fits with Common Purpose:

http://www.rense.com/general78/dicke.htm