Reviews for What Orwell Didn't Know: Propaganda and the New Face of American Politics

The average rating for What Orwell Didn't Know: Propaganda and the New Face of American Politics based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-12-22 00:00:00 John M Alo Twenty American writers convened on November 7, 2007 at Columbia University in New York to honor the 60th anniversary of George Orwell's classic essay on propaganda: Politics and the English Language, George Orwell was a British but his works were known all over the world so this did not stop many Americans to read, analyze and short of venerate his works. Some find them to be prophetic. I am not an American but after reading 4 of his book Down and Out in Paris and in London, 1984, Animal Farm and A Collection of Essays, I cannot blame these 20 American writers. I, too, believed in that Orwell was one of the brilliant novelists of our 20th century. He deserved all the attention or even accolades of the people generations and generations after his death. His works are deathless. His understanding of English language and its scope and influence to people are so astounding that a mortal being like me cannot readily understand it. In the above-mentioned essay, 64 years ago, he said that English as a language impacts the political system and the political system likewise impacts or influences the English language. It is similar to the drunkard man. He drinks because he is lonely but the more he drinks, the more he gets lonely. Then he openly criticized some phrases taken from lecture notes or writings of some English professors from big universities in England. From there he suggested 6 Rules for Writers: 1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which are used to seeing in print. 2. Never use a long word where a short one will do. 3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out. 4. Never use a passive voice where you can use the active. 5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you think of an everyday English equivalent. 6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous. Then each of the 20 writers in the conference reacted to these 6 rules citing examples of what Orwell did not know that would happen 60 years ago. Their responses, written in essays range far and wide: from the effect of television and computing, to the vast expansion of knowledge about how our brain respond to symbolic messages, to the merger of journalism and entertainment, to lessons learned during and after a half-century of totalitarianism. Some of the writings are very cerebral and I had quite a difficult time understanding them. Some are more heartfelt using American leaders like President Bush ordering the attack in Iraq as something that Orwell would have approved because it was anti-totalitarianism. On the other hand, some of them said that Orwell would not approve it since Bush practically did a doublethink by saying that there were weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) in Iraq. Also, the way some Americans behave in Iraq was intrusive could be a violation of their human rights. I guess the bottom line is that it all depends on what you believe as a person regardless in which country you are a citizen of. Orwell was a great writer but nobody could really predict what would happen tomorrow, next week, next month, year, decade and obviously 60 years after today. But if I were George Orwell and the book that I've written 60 years ago was still being discussed, that's proof enough of how brilliant I was. And I would be smiling from heaven's above.

Review # 2 was written on 2008-01-09 00:00:00 Tsing Duo An insightful and thought-provoking series of 18 original essays, published in 2007, on propaganda, politics, and the media in the U.S., with George Orwell's 1946 essay "Politics and the English Language" as the touchstone. Among the essayists are Francine Prose, David Rieff, Frances FitzGerald, and George Lakoff. There's food for thought on almost every page. "Americans enjoy open access to an astonishing array of information; yet they are bombarded with so many messages, and diverted by such mesmerizing amusements, that millions tune out from politics altogether."