This news is current as I read the novel, We (Мы). Written by Yevgeny Zamyatin in Soviet era Russia in 1924, it is the least read of the Russian classics. It’s a dystopian novel describing an oppressive totalitarian state, in which its subjects are made the joyless tools of industry and the state machine. Sound familiar? George Orwell was commissioned to write a review of a smuggled copy in the 1940s, and within six months of doing that, guess what? Yes, that’s right, he was inspired to begin work on “his” novel, 1984. What a coincidence, eh? And even more spooky, the few good bits of his awful book, were identical to those in already set out in We.
Tag: literary criticism
29th March – How can you say, I go about things the wrong way?
He has a point, although, to be fair, I did mention this at the beginning, when I called Proust a ponce. I wonder if he thought I meant nonce, not ponce? Too late now. And this isn’t an argument about 1984; it’s about sun and air. And suffocation.
29th March – Get sick, get well, Hang around a’ ink well
No sour grapes on my part when I say that the gatekeepers to literary stardom in this country would be incapable of judging who is the most cunning between Joey Essex and the Duchess of Sussex.
8th March – I polished up that handle so carefully, That now I am the Ruler of the Queen’s Navy.
I’ll lose my audience if I give them much more of the poor me. -You don’t want to sound like Meghan Markle, do you? Look how nauseating all that is.
Dickie White's Diary 