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George Orwell Quotes - Page 6

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The upper class desire to remain so, the middle class wish to overthrow the upper class, and the lower class want a classless system.

The upper class desire to remain so, the middle class wish to overthrow the upper class, and the lower class want a classless system.

Class, Wish, Desire

War is evil, but it is often the lesser evil.

War, Evil, Literature

Until they became conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious.

Truth, Freedom, Knowledge

All the papers that matter live off their advertisements, and the advertisers exercise an indirect censorship over news.

Exercise, Marketing, News

George Orwell (2009). “Facing Unpleasant Facts: Narrative Essays”, p.124, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

If thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought. A bad usage can spread by tradition and imitation even among people who should and do know better.

People, Language, Tradition

George Orwell, Keith Gessen (2009). “All Art Is Propaganda: Critical Essays”, p.282, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

You must try harder. It is not easy to become sane.

Trying, Easy, Harder

George Orwell (1983). “1984”, p.539, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

A humanitarian is always a hypocrite.

Hypocrite, Insult, Humanitarian

George Orwell (1970). “A Collection of Essays”, p.120, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

The great enemy of clear language is insincerity.

Inspirational, Enemy, Language

"All Art Is Propaganda: Critical Essays".

In our time political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible.

Time, Writing, Political Language

George Orwell (1956). “The Orwell Reader: Fiction, Essays, and Reportage”, New York : Harcourt, Brace

All left-wing parties in the highly industrialized countries are at bottom a sham, because they make it their business to fight against something which they do not really wish to destroy. They have internationalist aims, and at the same time they struggle to keep up a standard of life with which those aims are incompatible. We all live by robbing Asiatic coolies, and those of us who are 'enlightened' all maintain that those coolies ought to be set free; but our standard of living, and hence our 'enlightenment,' demands that the robbery shall continue.

Country, Struggle, Party

George Orwell (1956). “The Orwell Reader: Fiction, Essays, and Reportage”, New York : Harcourt, Brace

One's got to change the system, or one changes nothing.

George Orwell (1987). “Keep the Aspidistra Flying”, Harvill Secker

Sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield.

Reality, Bumps, Belief

After World War II; quoted in the London Financial Times, 13 May 2003.

A man receiving charity always hates his benefactor- it is a fixed characteristic of human nature

Hate, Men, Receiving

George Orwell (2012). “Down and Out in Paris and London”, p.132, Lulu.com

At fifty everyone has the face he deserves.

Birthday, Fifty, Faces

Notebook, 17 Apr. 1949. These were Orwell's last words in his notebook. He died on 21 Jan. 1950, at the age of forty-six.

We are in a strange period of history in which a revolutionary has to be a patriot and a patriot has to be a revolutionary.

Strange, Revolutionary, Patriot

George Orwell (1998). “A patriot after all, 1940-1941”, Martin Secker & Warburg Ltd

The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it.

Peace, Military, War

Polemic May 1946 "Second Thoughts on James Burnham"

Comrades!' he cried. 'You do not imagine, I hope, that we pigs are doing this in a spirit of selfishness and privilege? Many of us actually dislike milk and apples. I dislike them myself. Our sole object in taking these things is to preserve our health. Milk and apples (this has been proved by Science, comrades) contain substances absolutely necessary to the well-being of a pig. We pigs are brainworkers. The whole management and organisation of this farm depend on us. Day and night we are watching over your welfare. It is for your sake that we drink the milk and eat those apples.

Animal, Night, Pigs

George Orwell, A.M. Heath (2003). “Animal Farm and 1984”, p.39, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.

Life, Happiness, Truth

Nineteen Eighty-Four pt. 1, ch. 7 (1949) See Orwell 19

The pleasures of spring are available to everybody and cost nothing.

Spring, Cost, Pleasure

George Orwell (2009). “Facing Unpleasant Facts: Narrative Essays”, p.215, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

If you turn the other cheek, you will get a harder blow on it than you got on the first one. This does not always happen, but it is to be expected, and you ought not to complain if it does happen.

Blow, Doe, Complaining

George Orwell, Keith Gessen (2009). “All Art Is Propaganda: Critical Essays”, p.330, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

The relative freedom which we enjoy depends of public opinion. The law is no protection. Governments make laws, but whether they are carried out, and how the police behave, depends on the general temper in the country. If large numbers of people are interested in freedom of speech, there will be freedom of speech, even if the law forbids it; if public opinion is sluggish, inconvenient minorities will be persecuted, even if laws exist to protect them.

Country, Freedom, Law

George Orwell (2016). “Fifty Essays (George Orwell) (Literary Thoughts Edition)”, p.501, epubli

The essential act of war is destruction, not necessarily of human lives, but of the products of human labor. War is a way of shattering to pieces, or pouring into the stratosphere, or sinking in the depths of the sea, materials which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable, and hence, in the long run, too intelligent.

Running, War, Intelligent

George Orwell, A.M. Heath (2003). “Animal Farm and 1984”, p.283, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

In a Society in which there is no law, and in theory no compulsion, the only arbiter of behaviour is public opinion. But public opinion, because of the tremendous urge to conformity in gregarious animals, is less tolerant than any system of law. When human beings are governed by "thou shalt not", the individual can practise a certain amount of eccentricity: when they are supposedly governed by "love" or "reason", he is under continuous pressure to make him behave and think in exactly the same way as everyone else.

Thinking, Animal, Law

George Orwell, Keith Gessen (2009). “All Art Is Propaganda: Critical Essays”, p.305, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Huge events like the Ukraine famine of 1933, involving the deaths of millions of people, have actually escaped the attention of the majority of English russophiles.

Ukraine, People, Majority

George Orwell (2005). “In defence of English cooking”, Penguin Hardcover

A man may take to drink because he feels himself to he a failure, and then fail all the more completely because he drinks. It is rather the same thing that is happening to the English language. It becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.

Men, Ugly, May

George Orwell, Keith Gessen (2009). “All Art Is Propaganda: Critical Essays”, p.270, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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