1984

George Orwell's '1984' Is A Best-seller Again. Here's Why It Resonates Now

... is also fascinated by as a historian. He cites a famous line in “Nineteen Eighty-Four,” a party slogan: “Who controls the past, controls the future.”. But Stansky and other historians also say that to a certain extent, Orwell’s fears about a mutable past have already come true with the rise of the Internet, where anything can be rewritten or deleted. And John Rodden, who has written 10 books on Orwell, said this is not the first time sales of “Nineteen Eighty-Four” have surged since it was published. He remembers when sales went up in the early 1980 s , which Rodden says was not just about the approach of the year 1984, but also driven by “similar anxieties about a new administration”–when Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, he “was looked upon by many liberals and radicals as a warmonger.”. “[Reagan] was even ...

Alternative Facts' Seem To Boost '1984' To Best-seller List

... As  The Guardian  pointed out Tuesday, the book has become a  bestseller on Amazon. It reached the number 3 spot by Tuesday afternoon. Orwell didn't use the phrase "alternative facts" in his book. But the phrase reminded those who have read the book of the term "newspeak.". Merriam-Webster's definition  of it is "propagandistic language marked by euphemism, circumlocution, and the inversion of customary meanings." The dictionary didn't tweet out that definition to Conway. But it did  tweet the definition  of the word "fact.". The concept of "alternative facts"  even came up  in the Senate confirmation hearing for President Trump's pick to lead the Office of Management and Budget. "Are you comfortable as you proceed as a key budget adviser presenting falsehoods as simply an alternative fact?" Sen. Jeff Merkley asked Mick Mulvaney. We probably shouldn't expect the phrase "alternative facts" to go away ...

Six Of The Best Books To Read In Trumpian Times

... An erstwhile Bolshevik, Zamyatin brilliantly looked to Swift in dissecting the follies of totalitarianism. His astutely disparaging depiction of the fraudulent inevitabilities of a bogus paradise built on lies is a perfect and  perceptive antidote to Trump’s fake promises of a new Utopia. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (1865). Trying to find Trump’s alter ego in literature is tricky, as usually the bad guys are at least dignified. He’s not Milton’s Satan from Paradise Lost, and not dastardly clever like Batman’s nemesis, the Joker. He is not Sauron, the Dark Lord from Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings (1954-1955); he’s not even JK Rowling’s Lord Voldemort. He is best compared with Carroll’s petulant Queen of Hearts. She too resides in an absurdist alternative universe. ...

1984' Tops Amazon Bestseller List After Trump Aide's 'alternative Facts

... said. TUMULTY: It just immediately reminded me of doublethink, and war is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength. There's really no alternative to the facts. NEARY: CNN tweeted Tumulty's remark, and other journalists also made the connection. Yesterday, The New York Times' influential book critic Michiko Kakutani tweeted excerpts from the book, including this one. UNIDENTIFIED MAN: Newspeak was designed not to extend, but to diminish the range of thought. NEARY: For her part, Karen Tumulty says she's more concerned where all this is leading. TUMULTY: Unless you can have pretty much everybody agree to precisely what the truth is and what the reality is, it really - it's hard to imagine a situation where people then can sit down and negotiate and figure their way towards solutions. NEARY: Earlier this week, Signet ordered a new printing of 75,000 copies of "1984" and is considering even more. Lynn Neary, NPR News, Washington. Copyright © 2017 NPR. All rights reserved. ...

On ‘1984,’ Alternative Park Service Tweets And Half An Onion

... Updated 4:50 pm, Wednesday, January 25, 2017. Photo: Jose Luis Magana, Associated Press. Image 1 of/1. Madonna performs on stage during the Women’s March rally Jan. 21 in Washington. Photo: Jose Luis Magana, Associated Press. On ‘1984,’ alternative park service tweets and Half an Onion. 1 / 1. Back to Gallery. These wacky Trump days. A Texas radio station bans Madonna. George Orwell’s “1984” briefly tops Amazon’s bestseller list. A “resistance” team from the National Park Service comes out with its own Twitter feed. And half an onion in a plastic bag has passed 500,000 Twitter followers as it continues to tweak President Trump. Yes, Trump’s first few days in office have been particularly active on social media. The radio station went after Madonna for her lack of “patriotism”; Orwell’s book features a Ministry of Truth that offers up, uh, alternative facts; and the unofficial Park Service feed came because of a crackdown on some official ones. As for Half an Onion, it tweets things like, “For the record, I’m ...

Here Are 4 Eerie Similarities To Trump's America

... in. The horrible thing about the Two Minutes Hate was not that one was obliged to act a part, but, on the contrary, that it was impossible to avoid joining in. Within thirty seconds any pretense was always unnecessary. A hideous ecstasy of fear and vindictiveness, a desire to kill, to torture, to smash faces in with a sledge-hammer, seemed to flow through the whole group of people like an electric current, turning one even against one's will into a grimacing, screaming lunatic. Distracting the Proles. Winston often envied the life of the proletariat, also known as proles, because they were able to live in a state of blissful ignorance. They were not taunted by the truth and were left to their vices, unlike those of the ruling party who were monitored more closely. Winston believed that if the proles could wake up they could overthrow the government. Big Brother did not see them as a threat and kept them too distracted to be aware of the truth, as described in part one, ...

It’s 1984 All Over Again

... to NGOs that helped provide abortion services for women overseas. The Mexico City policy, also known as the global gag rule, was first put in place by Ronald Reagan in 1984. Its reintroduction drew condemnation from abortion rights and reproductive health campaigners. And people were quick to point out that Trump signed this executive order, which could impact the lives of hundreds of thousands of women, surrounded by men. The Huffington Post said that under the administration of Barack Obama, which rescinded the ban in 2009, US funds helped 27 m women access contraceptives. The US government spends around $600 m a year on international assistance for family planning and reproductive health. In the Oval Office, Trump was surrounded by White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, National Trade Council adviser Peter Navarro, Senior Adviser Jared Kushner, policy adviser Stephen Miller, and chief strategist Steve Bannon. Vice President ...

Key Concepts From George Orwell's 1984 Suggest Why It's Amazon's Best-selling Book In The Age Of Trump

... George Orwell’s classic has moved from number 6 to number 1 on Amazon’s overall bestselling books list. The Guardian noted its placement at number 6 yesterday. The shift comes just days after White House press secretary Sean Spicer told assembled reporters a blatant lie about the size of crowds at Donald Trump’s inauguration, and after Trump’s counselor Kellyanne Conway defended the untruth as “alternative facts.”. Of course we can’t be sure that the Trump administration’s recent blunders are driving sales of the novel; 1984 is also taught in schools across the US, and there are other perennial classics on Amazon’s 100 bestsellers list, like The Great Gatsby and To Kill a Mockingbird. A spokesman from Signet, a Penguin Random House imprint, however, says that on Jan. 25 the publisher ordered an extra 100,000 copies based on demand. That’s on top of its ...

1984 Tops Bestseller Charts; Alexa Pleases Trekkies; Hp Extends Battery Recall

... writing, the book was the number one bestseller on __link__ and number three on rel=”nofollow”> __link__. Beam me up, Alexa. If you’re in the Venn diagram where Star Wars geeks and home assistant enthusiasts interface, rejoice: Amazon has just added a new “wake word” to its Echo and Echo Dot home assistants that you’ll like. Sophos Home. Learn More. The default word to alert your device that it should listen up is “Alexa”, and until the most recent update was pushed out, you could change that either to “Echo” or “Amazon” – handy if you were uncomfortable with issuing orders to a clearly female name, for example. Now you can also wake up your Echo or your Dot by saying “Computer”. However, although there are some Star Trek tricks up the Echo and Dot’s sleeves (ask it to “set phasers to stun”), the technology isn’t quite at the same level as LCARS. Yet. HP recalls another 101,000 laptop batteries. Samsung has been in the spotlight over the past few months with its exploding battery issues, but it’s not the only tech company to have had problems with overheating power sources: HP has had to ...

Alternative Facts:' Why The Trump Team Is 'planting A Flag' In War On Media

... ways it will "fight back" is to simply deny that two plus two equals four. "Alternative facts" is "a George Orwell phrase," Washington Post reporter Karen Tumulty said, referring to the science fiction novel "1984.". "This brings us to '1984' doublethink, where war is really peace, where famine is really plenty. That's what's happening here," political historian Allan Lichtman said on CNN Sunday afternoon. The phrase was a top trending topic on Twitter during the day. Some people made jokes while others took it very seriously. "'Alternative facts' is a euphemism of propagandists and authoritarians. The new White House administration is full of both. Actual facts," MTV's Jamil Smith tweeted. The Merriam-Webster dictionary even tweaked Conway by tweeting out the definition of a "fact.". "May I say that we teach no courses in our journalism program about alternative facts," Frank Sesno, the director of the school and media public affairs at the George Washington ...