The Prevention of Literature

by George Orwell

George Orwell set out ‘to make political writing into an art’, and to a wide extent this aim shaped the future of English literature – his descriptions of authoritarian regimes helped to form a new vocabulary that is fundamental to understanding totalitarianism. While 1984 and Animal Farm are amongst the most popular classic novels in the English language, this new series of Orwell’s essays seeks to bring a wider selection of his writing on politics and literature to a new readership. In The Prevention of Literature, the third in the Orwell’s Essays series, Orwell considers the freedom of thought and expression. He discusses the effect of the ownership of the press on the accuracy of reports of events, and takes aim at political language, which ‘consists almost entirely of prefabricated phrases bolted together.’ The Prevention of Literature is a stirring cry for freedom from censorship, which Orwell says must start with the writer ‘To write in plain vigorous language one has to think fearlessly.’ 'A writer who can – and must – be rediscovered with every age.' — Irish Times

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction, Essays

Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 1946

About the author

Eric Arthur Blair was an English novelist, poet, essayist, journalist and critic who wrote under the pen name of George Orwell. His work is characterised by lucid prose, social criticism, opposition to all totalitarianism (both fascism and stalinism), and support of democratic socialism.

Orwell is best known for his allegorical novella Animal Farm (1945) and the dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), although his works also encompass literary criticism, poetry, fiction and polemical journalism. His non-fiction works, including The Road to Wigan Pier (1937), documenting his experience of working-class life in the industrial north of England, and Homage to Catalonia (1938), an account of his experiences soldiering for the Republican faction of the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939), are as critically respected as his essays on politics, literature, language and culture.

Orwell's work remains influential in popular culture and in political culture, and the adjective "Orwellian"—describing totalitarian and authoritarian social practices—is part of the English language, like many of his neologisms, such as "Big Brother", "Thought Police", "Room 101", "Newspeak", "memory hole", "doublethink", and "thoughtcrime". In 2008, The Times named Orwell the second-greatest British writer since 1945.

Reviews

[Ardavan Bayat · Rating 5 out of 5]

دریافت این جستار از:
https://t.me/Zamyad_Culture/571

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wrote in 1946 we have to remember the historical context of this piece directly after the devastation of WW 2 and also the grief, loss and fear of the world at large. This essay is essential reading before the reading of 1984. George Orwell has no way of foreseeing social media or reality TV but here is an essay on his fears for free speech, prose writing, censorship, the rise of television and radio and the death of intellectual liberty. This essay is still relevant today in a world of reality tv, pulp fiction, social media, fake news sites and knowing what is real and what is false.

[Moneeza Rafiq · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't think you can read Orwell's works like 1984 and Animal Farm without reading essays like this one, which perfectly complements the themes and aims behind his novels. This essay talks of how writing "means the freedom to criticize and oppose", and in a totalitarian state a prose writer cannot survive as he/she writes plainly and cannot hide behind the convoluted and elusive language of poetry. Beautifully written. Orwell explains it very well.

[Ellie Book Worm · Rating 5 out of 5]

Literature is doomed if liberty of thought perishes

From a totalitarian point of view history is something to be created rather than learned

If you haven't yet, I highly encourage everyone to read this essay. It is needed now more than ever, especially in the western world - where information, media and diversity of ideas are being purged in the name of progress. Be wary of those who seek to silence; be wary of those against freedom of thought, freedom of expression and freedom of speech.

[Ke · Rating 5 out of 5]

读下来感触良多的一篇文章。接着Bookshop Memories和Confessions of a Book Reviewer就快要忘记作者是写出1984和Animal Farm的George Orwell时给我的当头一棒。
摘录了一些句子，一定会反复咀嚼的一篇文章。
On the one side are its theoretical enemies, the apologists of totalitarianism, and on the other its immediate, practical enemies, monopoly and bureaucracy.
The sort of things that are working against him are the concentration of the press in the hands of a few rich men, the grip of monopoly on radio and the films, the unwillingness of the public to spend money on books, making it necessary for nearly every writer to earn part of his living by hackwork...
The fog of lies and misinformation that surrounds such subjects as the Ukraine famine, the Spanish civil war, Russian policy in Poland, and so forth, is not due entirely to conscious dishonesty, but any writer or journalist who is fully sympathetic for the U.S.S.R. — sympathetic, that is, in the way the Russians themselves would want him to be...
Above a quite low level, literature is an attempt to influence the viewpoint of one’s contemporaries by recording experience.
If he is to switch his allegiance at exactly the right moment, he must either tell lies about his subjective feelings, or else suppress them altogether. In either case he has destroyed his dynamo. Not only will ideas refuse to come to him, but the very words he uses will seem to stiffen under his touch.

[Criipeur · Rating 5 out of 5]

c’est le premier livre que George Orwell que j’ai lu, avant la Ferme des Animaux que j’ai toujours réussi à lire ou 1984.

je comprends pourquoi on considère cette auteur, il est très fort, ces mots sont juste et percutant et surtout il est tellement visionnaire cet homme c’est dingue il avait tellement raison !

à lire, surtout dans cette période où l’extrême droite et le fascisme prend toujours plus du terrain. à l’époque où je l’ai lu l’extrême droite n’était pas aussi avancé et ça fait peur de se rendre à quel point elle a pris de la place dans le débat publique

chef-d’œuvre

[میثم موسوی نسیم‌آبادی]

دولت توتالیتر عملاً حکومتی آیینی است و کاهنان و حاکمان برای این‌که در مقامشان باقی بمانند باید معصوم و خطاناپذیر دانسته شوند. توتالیتاریسم در نقطه تلاقی ادبیات و سیاست، بزرگ‌ترین فشار را بر روشنفکر وارد می‌کند و این توضیحی است برای این‌که چرا در همۀ کشورها پشتیبانی از حکومت‌ها برای دانشمندان آسان‌تر از نویسندگان است (اورول، ۱۳۸۹: ۴۶ الی۶۲).

مصطفی ملکیان نیز به‌‌مانند جورج اورول به مخالفت برخی از حکومت‌ها با علوم انسانی پرداخته و متذکر شده است که حکومت‌های استبدادی با علوم طبیعی کاری ندارند و تنها با علوم انسانی مشکل دارند؛ چون به محض این‌که کسی الفبای علوم انسانی را بفهمد درک می‌کند که یک سؤال، یک جواب ندارد و چنین حرفی یک توهّم خواهد بود درحالی‌که در علوم مهندسی و علوم طبیعی یک سؤال، یک جواب دارد. علوم انسانی ذاتاً پلورالیست هستند. برخلاف علوم فنی که ذاتاً مونیست هستند و خب رژیم‌های توتالیتر هم معتقدند که هر سؤال تنها یک جواب دارد، جوابی که آن‌ها می‌دهند. رژیم‌های توتالیتر اقتدار ندارند و صرفاً قدرت دارند و برای حفظ این قدرت رابطۀ آن‌ها با دانشمندان علوم فنی خوب است؛ زیرا وقتی توپ و تانک بخواهی باید با مهندسان دوست باشی (ملکیان، ۱۳۸۸: ذیل «حکومت‌های استبدادی و علوم انسانی»)!

منابع:
_ اورول، جورج، ۱۳۸۹، «جلوگیری از ادبیات»، ترجمه عزت‌الله فولادوند، بخارا، شماره ۷۵.

_ ملکیان، مصطفی، ۱۳۸۸، «حکومت‌های استبدادی و علوم انسانی»، دانشگاه تهران.

[Sahiblu Tayang · Rating 5 out of 5]

I want to read this book 😭😭😭