J. G. Ballard Quotes

We've come into the world of '1984,' but it turns out to be '1984'-Lite.

It seems appropriate that the author of '1984' was a British citizen. George Orwell must have seen how easily the great British public's lamb-like disposition toward its leaders could be exploited to create a police state.

For much of the twentieth century, 1984 was a year that belonged to the future - a strange, gray future at that. Then it slid painlessly into the past, like any other year. Big Brother arrived and settled in, though not at all in the way George Orwell had imagined.

Who are these evil ones? In 1984, the evil one was called Goldstein. Orwell was writing a grim parody. But these people running the United States mean what they say. If I were a teacher, I would recommend that all my students very hurriedly read most of Orwell's books, especially 1984 and Animal Farm, because then they'd begin to understand the world we live in.

Orwell wasn't right about where society was in 1984. We haven't turned into that sort of surveillance society. But that may be, at least in small part, because of his book. The notion that ubiquitous surveillance and state manipulation of the media is evil is deeply engrained in us.

'1984' is not a wonder tale. Not only could it happen, but it has happened, but under different names.

War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.

Think about George Orwell's three-minute hate from the novel '1984' and how that left everyone sort of exhausted and able to live their boring humdrum lives. If our lives are going to continue being unfulfilled and boring, perhaps we do need some sort of short-term violent chaos incorporated into them, to make them more palatable.

'1984' is terrifyingly relevant. It generates a political conversation, but it's an exciting piece of theatre. Every day, there are things to be spawned from Orwell's mind, whether it's in England or America, terrorist-related or government-related.

I've always been interested in those Orwellian dystopian novels, like 'Fahrenheit 451,' 'Brave New World,' and obviously Orwell's '1984.'

Orwell had a very accurate foresight of today's dystopian world we live in. If only he was around to see it.

Dystopia is a very interesting setting. Whether it's '1984' or 'Fahrenheit 451'... Dystopia is a wonderfully cinematic setting.

I used to wonder: Is Huxley right or is Orwell right? It turns out they're both right. First you get the new world state and endless diversions as you are disempowered. And then, as we are watching, credit dries up, and the cheap manufactured goods of the consumer society are no longer cheap. Then you get the iron fist of Oceania, of Orwell's 1984.

I would ask, 'Have you read '1984'? Have you read 'Brave New World'? If so, I'm sorry, but you read science fiction.'

As a reader, I've always been interested in dystopian novels like 'Nineteen Eighty-four'.

Authoritarian systems evolve. Authoritarianism in the Internet Age is not your old Cold War authoritarianism.

Dystopian novels, such as Orwell's 'Nineteen Eighty-Four,' often tend to site their despotised or deformed civilisations in urban environments.

In 1984, George Orwell wrote of a world where the only colour to be found was in the propaganda posters. Such is the case in North Korea. Images of Kim Il-sung are depicted in vivid colours. Rays of yellow and orange emanate from his face: he is the sun.

I majored in English in college, so I read the classic dystopian novels like '1984' and 'Brave New World.'

Our age has seen the birth of totalitarian systems and forms of tyranny which would not have been possible in the time before the technological leap forward.

Modernization vastly increased the power of the state. It gave the rulers new tools—the powers of indoctrination, surveillance, and repression.

Even the most repressive regimes seek to maintain the fiction that they have the people’s interest at heart.

… the inhuman communist police state tyranny

To the future or to the past, to a time when thought is free...to a time when truth exists, and what is done cannot be undone...from the age of uniformity, from the age of solitude, from the age of big brother, from the age of doublethink--greetings!

1984 is such an iconic, loaded year in so many ways.