I read it twice in high school and thought I was so smart for liking it.
The biggest problem with it is the fact it’s an allegory for the Stalin era USSR where Hitler, the Holocaust, and Lebensraum are completely absent. Why did Orwell leave them out? What does Orwell even think of Hitler, personally?
I should like to put it on record that I have never been able to dislike Hitler. Ever since he came to power I have reflected that I would certainly kill him if I could get within reach of him, but that I could feel no personal animosity. The fact is that there is something deeply appealing about him. […] One feels, as with Napoleon, that he is fighting against destiny, that he can’t win, and yet that he somehow deserves to. […] However they may be as economic theories, Fascism and Nazism are psychologically far sounder than any hedonistic conception of life.
To your and Maoel’s point though, Orwell substitutes class analysis for an elitism where big totalitarian dictators can totally hoodwink the masses because the masses are just too stupid. This misanthropy is fascist, it’s the same energy that all forms of chauvinism use to turn people against themselves. It’s all connected.
I read it twice in high school and thought I was so smart for liking it.
The biggest problem with it is the fact it’s an allegory for the Stalin era USSR where Hitler, the Holocaust, and Lebensraum are completely absent. Why did Orwell leave them out? What does Orwell even think of Hitler, personally?
(from George Orwell, “Review of Mein Kampf” (1940))
Hmm… maybe this guy kinda likes Hitler? (I owe this criticism to https://redsails.org/masses-elites-and-rebels/#george-orwells-very-british-antisemitism)
To your and Maoel’s point though, Orwell substitutes class analysis for an elitism where big totalitarian dictators can totally hoodwink the masses because the masses are just too stupid. This misanthropy is fascist, it’s the same energy that all forms of chauvinism use to turn people against themselves. It’s all connected.