George Orwell said about his classic dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, ‘I do not believe that the kind of society I describe necessarily will arrive, but I believe that something resembling it could arrive.’ This event, produced in partnership between WoWFEST: FAHRENHEIT 2024 and Your Local Arena, asks: just how close are we to Orwell’s vision — or are we already there?
In 1984, BBC’s Arena ran a series of programmes about the life of George Orwell. Part V begins with the tragic death of his wife Eileen in March 1945. Overcome with grief and despairing of the future, Orwell retreated to Jura, a remote Hebridean island. Here, crippled with tuberculosis and isolated from the world, Orwell wrote his last novel, Nineteen Eighty-four, a nightmare vision of a totalitarian future. Orwell explained that ‘The scene of the book is laid in Britain in order to emphasise that the English-speaking races are not innately better than anyone else and that totalitarianism, if not fought against, could triumph anywhere.’ So, are we awake, resisting or sleepwalking into the darkness once again, as imagined by Orwell?
Come and watch this classic film about one of the country’s finest writers and listen to a talk afterwards about how near we are to a nineteen eighty-four-type world. Speakers: Dolan Cummings, Director of the Manifesto Club; Director of English PEN Daniel Gorman; and freedom of speech expert Sara Whyatt. The event will also include a new poem inspired by the film by Francesca Beard.
Event Date: Thursday 16th May 2024
