“There was the truth and there was the lie, and if you held on to the truth even against the whole world, you were not mad” (Orwell). These words were spoken by the brilliant postmodernist writer, George Orwell. The postmodernist movement took place in the late 1950s. They were times marked by consumption, the post-Cold War and the Second World War. The main topics of this literary movement concerned moral and philosophical relativism, loss of faith in political authority, and avoidance of traditional themes. Postmodernism has had one of the greatest impacts on fiction writing. George Orwell's love of writing and fear of excessive authority popularized this era of literary movement. While George Orwell may be a popular guy today, he wasn't always this way. Growing up he was the weird middle child. In the poem "Why I Write" he states that he was very lonely and had an unpleasant personality which made people not particularly fond of him (Leddy). Orwell had the ability to face unpleasant facts which, according to him, led him into his own private world which teachers and authorities did not appreciate. They made him feel helpless and undervalued; this inspired him to write about similar circumstances in the political context. He had a clear vision for each story and didn't want to write all the extra “fluff” (Smith). He is best known for this new style of writing, which eliminates the "purple passages", for his Newspeak language, and for exploring political writing and popularizing this type. This changed the tone of writing in the 1950s and woke the world to the dangers of government. "Erotic Dreams from Nightmares: Threatening Problems and Suggestions of Sublimation in Orwell" by Thomas Dilworth is an excellent critical analysis of the novel 1984. Thomas doe ...... middle of paper ...... writer of modernism. Works Cited Dilsworth, Thomas. “Erotic Dreams in Nightmares: Threatening Problems and Sublimations in Orwell.” Ebscohost. Articles on Language and Literature, n.d. Web. May 15, 2014.Leddy, Chuck. "George Orwell on Writing." Literary Resource Center. March 2006. Web. May 20, 2014..Means, AL A Student's Guide to George Orwell Enslow Publishers Inc. New Jersey, 2005. Print.Orwell, George. 1984. New York: Penguin, 1989. Print.Smith, David. Orwell for beginners. Writers and Readers Publishing, Inc. New York, 1998.Print.
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