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Feminist retelling of Nineteen Eighty-Four approved by Orwell’s estate

- https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/ ... lls-estate

Here are some choice excerpts from the article:

Publisher Granta said that Julia understands the world of Oceania “far better than Winston and is essentially happy with her life”. As Orwell puts it in Nineteen Eighty-Four, “in some ways she was far more acute than Winston, and far less susceptible to Party propaganda … She also stirred a sort of envy in him by telling him that during the Two Minutes Hate her great difficulty was to avoid bursting out laughing. But she only questioned the teachings of the Party when they in some way touched upon her own life. Often she was ready to accept the official mythology, simply because the difference between truth and falsehood did not seem important to her.”

“She has known no other world and, until she meets Winston, never imagined one. She’s opportunistic, believing in nothing and caring not at all about politics. She routinely breaks the rules but also collaborates with the regime whenever necessary. She’s an ideal citizen of Oceania,” said Granta. “But when one day, finding herself walking toward Winston Smith in a long corridor, she impulsively hands him a note – a potentially suicidal gesture – she comes to realise that she’s losing her grip and can no longer safely navigate her world.”

It would appear the world of 1984 only seemed so grim all these years due to male bias. For a balanced view on authoritarianism it's only proper to publish a woman's view on it. And if the woman's view becomes more popular, ought it follow that it become the better of the two texts to recommend? And surely we can't expect people to have to read both books. So it only makes sense to continue publishing the more popular one, and slowly discontinue the old one. And if there is only going to be one text for 1984, shouldn't it just be called 1984, instead of Julia?

Julia, Confessions of a Guardian Writer. Orwell will probably win.

Harvey » Sat Apr 03, 2021 12:21 am wrote:

drstrangelove » 09 Dec 2021 19:57 wrote:

Feminist retelling of Nineteen Eighty-Four approved by Orwell’s estate

- https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/ ... lls-estate

Here are some choice excerpts from the article:

Publisher Granta said that Julia understands the world of Oceania “far better than Winston and is essentially happy with her life”. As Orwell puts it in Nineteen Eighty-Four, “in some ways she was far more acute than Winston, and far less susceptible to Party propaganda … She also stirred a sort of envy in him by telling him that during the Two Minutes Hate her great difficulty was to avoid bursting out laughing. But she only questioned the teachings of the Party when they in some way touched upon her own life. Often she was ready to accept the official mythology, simply because the difference between truth and falsehood did not seem important to her.”

“She has known no other world and, until she meets Winston, never imagined one. She’s opportunistic, believing in nothing and caring not at all about politics. She routinely breaks the rules but also collaborates with the regime whenever necessary. She’s an ideal citizen of Oceania,” said Granta. “But when one day, finding herself walking toward Winston Smith in a long corridor, she impulsively hands him a note – a potentially suicidal gesture – she comes to realise that she’s losing her grip and can no longer safely navigate her world.”

It would appear the world of 1984 only seemed so grim all these years due to male bias. For a balanced view on authoritarianism it's only proper to publish a woman's view on it. And if the woman's view becomes more popular, ought it follow that it become the better of the two texts to recommend? And surely we can't expect people to have to read both books. So it only makes sense to continue publishing the more popular one, and slowly discontinue the old one. And if there is only going to be one text for 1984, shouldn't it just be called 1984, instead of Julia?

Obviously there will be more than one text. Some book called Julia won't replace 1984.

Orwell wrote/finished 1984 in 1948 and simply reversed the letters because he was talking about how his own society worked, not describing an authoritarian one.

Joe Hillshoist » Thu Dec 09, 2021 11:54 pm wrote:
Orwell wrote/finished 1984 in 1948 and simply reversed the letters because he was talking about how his own society worked, not describing an authoritarian one.

I was taught the same in high school, and was surprised to find out later in life that was absolutely mythological -- his letters and own writing make it clear that 1984 was an archly anti-Communist work inspired by his alarm at Stalin's Russia as much as it was motivated by the horrors of Nazi Germany. Orwell, just like the private school English teacher who sold me on that goofy fantasy, was a liberal with a great admiration for how his own society worked.

Big Sister is Watching You has a much better ring to it.

^ That's probably already written, Geoff Ryman's Oh Happy Day!, available in his collection Unconquered Countries.

Wombaticus Rex » 12 Dec 2021 03:01 wrote:

Joe Hillshoist » Thu Dec 09, 2021 11:54 pm wrote:
Orwell wrote/finished 1984 in 1948 and simply reversed the letters because he was talking about how his own society worked, not describing an authoritarian one.

I was taught the same in high school, and was surprised to find out later in life that was absolutely mythological -- his letters and own writing make it clear that 1984 was an archly anti-Communist work inspired by his alarm at Stalin's Russia as much as it was motivated by the horrors of Nazi Germany. Orwell, just like the private school English teacher who sold me on that goofy fantasy, was a liberal with a great admiration for how his own society worked.

Are you sure you aren't confusing that with Animal Farm?

We were taught 1984 was anti-totalitarian not a reflection of his own society. I eventually came to the conclusion alot of 1984 is present in post war England - the class system as well as the sexual repression and the strict conformity that is enforced by social mores. The people William Burroughs described as "...decent church-going women with their mean, pinched, bitter, evil faces." The middle class/bourgeois are the most puritanical people in society. Look what has just happened when they adopted "anti bigotry" as the basis for their puritanism instead of "anti sex drugs and jazz/modern music."

Proles can do what they want so long as they don't get involved in politics.

I think its more subtle than just "Its anti communist" or "Its a reflection of post war england". He is talking about processes of totalitarian control wherever they occur. Which is all about power. Its why so called democratic societies can slide into despotism.

Orwell never stopped being a Socialist for example even tho he was very anti Stalinist, but that is cos he anti tyranny - and ultimately that is about limiting the power of the state.

1984 isn't totalitarian. if it was, the authoritarian measures wouldn't be required. Brave New World is totalitarian.

1984 is how you get to Brave New World.

Animal farm is how you get to 1984.

Animal Farm > 1984 > Brave New World.

Orwell knew what he was doing. He planted very careful seeds so people knew how to recognise strategies of gradualism.

That Granta statement doesn't augur too well, but the book needn't necessarily be bad. Time will tell.

Some very good novels have been written from the viewpoint of a "secondary" or "minor" character in a famous older work. See, for instance, Jean Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea (1966) and Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre.(1847).

I am not mixing it up with Animal Farm.

Given the track records and mass graves involved, I see little contradiction in being a lifelong socialist and an arch anti-Communist; indeed, many liberals would profess precisely that.

Given the track records and mass graves involved, I see little contradiction in being a lifelong socialist and an arch anti-Communist

Oh boy, where to begin...

Edit: Unless I have the wrong end of a short stick...

I see what you meant now. I did have the wrong end of the stick, sorry.

Wombaticus Rex » 13 Dec 2021 08:14 wrote:I am not mixing it up with Animal Farm.

Given the track records and mass graves involved, I see little contradiction in being a lifelong socialist and an arch anti-Communist; indeed, many liberals would profess precisely that.

I'm glad you clarified that. I know alot of people who don't see a difference.

arch anti-Communist

"Arch" is right. 2021: Triumph of the Arch.

/ˈɑːrtʃ.li/ in an amused way that suggests you know more about something than someone else does: She smiled archly at him.
https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictio ... ish/archly

Sometime in the early 1990s:The great Michael Parenti gives one of his greatest talks.
NB: The correct title, the title he gave it, is "Reflections on the Overthrow of Communism".

https://play.acast.com/s/eastpodcast/61 ... ee77c87433

Arch, anticommunist:


https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Hitler%27s-Germania%3A-Propaganda-Writ-in-Stone-Boehlert/305e9fcf51f30d7625840b8f2d7d1bb7f48e7d3e/figure/11