Hi and hoo! Recently, my colleagues premiered a new podcast which is a reading circle for the whole of Norway. It struck me that I, who love to read so much, had never been in a reading circle. I simply don’t think I’m made for organized activities, because after completing my education I haven’t been a member of so much as a wine club. On the other hand, I think it’s GREAT to hear others talk about books on the radio and podcasts. So now I’m in full swing reading the book and listening to the podcast, and I hope you’ll join me on the journey. In this week’s book letter, I have also found a book cover that deserves a closer look, and I have a rather random reading tip, a biography of the rock tennis player André Agassi. Let’s start with one of the world’s best-known classics, which we are dusting off this autumn. In January 2017, a novel written in the 1940s suddenly jumped onto the bestseller lists. It happened after a press conference where Donald Trump’s team presented an excessively high figure on the number of attendees during the presidential inauguration. Special Counsel Kellyanne Conway’s use of the phrase alternative facts reminded people of a certain old book. They ran to the bookstore, and sales of George Orwell’s dystopia 1948 went up 9,500%. That “1984” can tell us something about fake news, totalitarian tendencies and artificial intelligence is one of the reasons why the newly started podcast “Leseklubben” chose this particular novel as its first book. When we talk about classics we should have read (again), “1984” is a book that many of us think of. I have had the novel sitting unread on the bookshelf for many years. Unconsciously, I probably thought that the real 1984 has come and gone a long time ago, so that book is probably a bit out of date as far as visions of the future are concerned? So I could be wrong. Have you read “1984”? Yes, but it’s been a while No Reading it now, actually Show result As one of the world’s most famous novels, “1984” is woven into our society. When someone today talks about Big Brother, we have to ask whether they mean the concept of reality or Orwell’s creation. Many people know Orwellian expressions such as Big brother sees you, gossip and thought police. But what actually happens in the novel? An ordinary worker in a totalitarian state one day begins to write a diary, which is strictly illegal. Through the diary, Winston Smith begins to question the dominant regime he lives in. Not only that, he falls in love with and sleeps with the beautiful Julia, in a world where lust must be eradicated. For those of us who remember the Soviet Union, it is clear which regime Orwell mainly had in mind when he wrote the book. Food shortages, obedience to the state, denunciation and the removal of people from the history books are all familiar from Stalin’s rule. Hitler’s Nazi Germany and Franco’s Fascist Spain also sing along. But “1984” is a future novel written in 1948, which was not at all outdated in 1984. The novel could just as well have been called “2024”, when you look at the world around us today. news’s Radioteater made a production of “1984” in 2014, with Jan Gunnar Røise and Silje Storstein as Winston and Julia. Photo: Julia Naglestad/Reuben Sletten / news Orwell is razor sharp in his analysis of totalitarian tendencies, which can be found both on the far right and on the left. Already six chapters into the book, I get so many associations with current phenomena that my brain goes like a pinball machine: ping, ping, ping! In the book, everyone is monitored by the state in their own homes. Just think how much we allow ourselves to be monitored, not only by the government, but by American companies: Meta knows what and who we like, Google knows what we wonder, Apple knows where we stay, and many of us share something so intimate such as heartbeat and breathing through our digital wristwatches. That school libraries in the USA are now removing “1984” from the shelves (due to sexual content) is tragic. While we’re on the subject of the United States, we should mention that more and more states are gaining dominion over women’s bodies and taking away from them the decision whether to carry a child or not. The whole of Russia is returning at full speed to precisely the Stalinist regime Orwell depicts in the novel, and states such as Iran, Afghanistan, China and North Korea have obvious similarities to the oppressive regime we meet in “1984”. Christine Lossius Thorin and Kristoffer Olsen have invited Live Nelvik to read Orwell in the Reading Club’s first season. I think I can safely say that we have never produced more dystopias than in our days, whether in the form of novels, films, TV series or computer games. Some of them are heavily inspired by Orwell, such as Margaret Atwood’s 1985 novel, The Handmaid’s Tale. Among all the dystopians, Orwell stands out with his emphasis on the power of language. Now I’m just coming home from a panel discussion on Orwell, language, Trump and American politics, so I’ll come back to this about the power of language in a later letter. With “1984”, George Orwell gives us a toolbox to trace totalitarian tendencies and oppression disguised as caring ideology. Therefore, it feels rebellious and important to read this book now, and to discuss it and understand it. The novel gives me the opportunity to examine how free I really am as a person. It will be quite dark in the second and third parts of the novel, but the advantage of reading the book together is that we can share the horror. George Orwell snapped in 1945 by a friend. Photo: Vernon Richards / George Orwell Archive/UCL Library Services I didn’t know much about Orwell, so in preparation for the Reading Club I listened to a longer talk about the author which is available for free: George Orwell: The Man and the Mind Behind « 1984″. If you don’t have two hours to spare to hear it, here are some anecdotes about the author: (Not so) fun facts about George Orwell George Orwell does not strictly exist. His name is Eric Arthur Blair, but wanted to write under a pseudonym to create a space between himself as a private person and author. Thus, there is also no gravestone for George Orwell. As a child he went to boarding school and was bullied, both by the older pupils and those who ran the school. Big Brother is presumably modeled on the manageress Mrs. Wilkes Orwell was first known as an essayist, and is behind amusing musings such as “Can Socialists be Happy?” and “In Defense of English Cooking.” Orwell never got to experience the success or revenue from sales after “1984”. He died of tuberculosis seven months after his release in 1949. On his deathbed, he married for the second time, to Sonia Brownell. She used up the money he earned on “Animal farm” and “1984”, and for a number of years put sticks in the wheels of anyone who tried to write a biography of Orwell. If you haven’t joined the “Reading Club” yet, it’s not too late! Here is the first episode: Cover of the week Another inner tier in terms of interaction between cover and title I found in “Animals that are worse parents than you”. Photo: Siss / news/Cappelen Damm/ The cute and the grotesque go hand in hand in this collaboration between biologist Anna Blix and illustrator Frøydis Sollid Simonsen, a book that presents 25 animal species that are really bad-ass parents. Did you know that the mother panda always gives birth to two cubs, but only one survives? She only has two arms and she has to use one to eat bamboo with. Ergo, the other twin falls to the ground and dies. Blix offers a number of examples where the logic of evolution ranges from clumsy to cunningly evil. The illustrations can be reminiscent of coloring books that are not quite finished, a bit delicate. At first glance, the animals are cute. If you look closely, you discover, for example, that the tiny golden hamster has blood around its snout because it is about to eat its children. Photo: Frøydis Sollid Simonsen/ Siss Vik / Cappelen Damm/news These are perfect stories to show when the children complain that they don’t get an iPhone 15 or you arrive too late to pick them up at the nursery. At least you don’t suck blood from your children, like the vampire ant does. By the way, Anna Blix was a guest on Nitimen here the other day, if you fancy hearing about more crazy animal parents. Now reading At publishing parties in August, I was still obsessed with the Olympics, and chatted about sports with those who cared. I got into tennis with Simen Gonsholt, who is a journalist, recently retired editor of the journal Vinduet, and has a golden pen and discerning taste. Simen said: – You must read “Open”, the autobiography of André Agassi. A few days later I was struck by a crippling cold, and tennis memoirs became a perfect companion in the hospital bed. “Open” was published in 2009, and is neither available in Norwegian nor on sale as a paper book anymore, but you can get hold of the audiobook and certainly an e-book. Photo: Audible Actually, I have a vague relationship with American André Agassi. All generations have their tennis legends, and mine are Björn Borg and John McEnroe. I struggle to remember the rules of tennis from time to time, but am fascinated by the mental challenge of this solitary game, man against man, which can drag on for hours if no one gets a match point. In the opening of the book, Agassi piques the reader’s curiosity when he says that he HATES tennis, and always has. How then did he manage to be ranked number one in the world? Behind every successful star is an ambitious father, one could say in this case. André’s father is an Iranian-born Armenian from a poor background, and he has one dream: One of his children will become the world’s best tennis player. If it costs the children’s blood, sweat and tears, so be it. The story is so boring and the father such a special character that there should be a TV series of this book. André Agassi is an excellent narrator, in collaboration with ghostwriter JR Moehringer. At school, André is most fond of English and is good at writing poetry, completely useless qualities on the tennis court. But such abilities are a good thing when telling your life story. TYPETE: The media thought Agassi was a rebellious and arrogant guy because he had a rock style, but in the book we get behind the image. Photo: Anonymous / AP Agassi has razor-sharp analytical skills and a photographic memory. I feel like I’m getting into the very soul of the sport. It is also a biography about the cost of early fame, and how difficult it is for a young person to find their identity in the relentless light of the media. I’m only a third of the way through the book, but I feel a burning question: Is a bad childhood worth it, if you actually become the best in the world? This is the second sports biography I’ve read in my life. If you know of books that maintain the same high level as “Open”, I’m ready for tips! Do you know someone who might enjoy Bokbrevet? It can be difficult to find again on news.no, so feel free to send it to a friend. Comment What do you think of Orwell’s “1984”, does it make you want to read it? Do you have any questions about how to join the Reading Club or other comments on this week’s letter? Fire away! Hello! Welcome to dialogue at news. Since you are logged in to other news services, you do not have to log in again here, but we need your consent to our terms of use for online dialogue Published 07.09.2024, at 07.50
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Book letter # 38 George Orwell’s novel 1984 is only more relevant in 2024 – Siss Vik’s book letter
