George Orwell Quotes - Page 5

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• It is not possible for any thinking person to live in such a society as our own without wanting to change it.

  George Orwell

  Thinking, Persons, Thinking Person

  George Orwell, Sonia Orwell, Ian Angus (1968). “The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell: An age like this, 1920-1940”, Harvill Secker

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• By 'nationalism' I mean first of all the habit of assuming that human beings can be classified like insects and that whole blocks of millions and tens of millions of people can be confidently labeled 'good' or 'bad'...By 'patriotism' I mean devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life, which one believes to be best in the world but has no wish to force on other people. Patriotism is of its nature defensive, both militarily and culturally. Nationalism, on the other hand, is inseparable from the desire for power.

  George Orwell

  Block, Believe, Mean

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• 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.

  George Orwell

  Country, Freedom, Law

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

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• Beauty is meaningless until it is shared.

  George Orwell

  Meaningless

  George Orwell (1974). “Burmese Days”, p.57, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Every Joke is a Tiny Revolution

  George Orwell

  Humor, Tiny, Revolution

  George Orwell, Ian Angus, Sheila Davison (1998). “The Complete Works of George Orwell: I have tried to tell the truth, 1943-1944”

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• The fallacy is to believe that under a dictatorial government you can be free inside

  George Orwell

  Believe, Government, Fallacy

  George Orwell (1986). “The complete works of George Orwell”

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• The typical socialist... a prim little man with a white-collar job, usually a secret teetotaler and often with vegetarian leanings.

  George Orwell

  Jobs, Men, White

  The Road to Wigan Pier (1937) ch. 11

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• They could be made to accept the most flagrant violations of reality, because they never fully grasped the enormity of what was demanded of them, and were not sufficiently interested in public events to notice what was happening

  George Orwell

  Reality, Tyrants, Events

  George Orwell (2003). “1984”, Plume Books

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• In real life it is always the anvil that breaks the hammer.

  George Orwell

  Real, Hammers, Anvils

  George Orwell (1970). “A Collection of Essays”, p.159, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• The point is that we are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield.

  George Orwell

  Faith, Believe, Reality

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

  35 Copy quote

• 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.

  George Orwell

  Country, Struggle, Party

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

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• The choice for mankind lies between freedom and happiness and for the great bulk of mankind, happiness is better.

  George Orwell

  Lying, Choices, Freedom And Happiness

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

  George Orwell

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

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• News is something somebody doesn't want printed; all else is advertising.

  George Orwell

  News, Want, Advertising

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• 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.

  George Orwell

  People, Language, Tradition

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

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

  George Orwell

  Life, Happiness, Truth

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

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

  George Orwell

  Peace, Military, War

  Polemic May 1946 "Second Thoughts on James Burnham"

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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.

  George Orwell

  Class, Wish, Desire

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• 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.

  George Orwell

  Strange, Revolutionary, Patriot

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

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

  George Orwell

  Trying, Easy, Harder

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

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• The great enemy of clear language is insincerity.

  George Orwell

  Inspirational, Enemy, Language

  "All Art Is Propaganda: Critical Essays".

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• Those who 'abjure' violence can do so only because others are committing violence on their behalf.

  George Orwell

  Violence, Behalf, Can Do

  George Orwell, Ian Angus, Sheila Davison (1998). “The Complete Works of George Orwell: I belong to the Left: 1945”

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• 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.

  George Orwell

  Animal, Night, Pigs

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

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

  George Orwell

  Hate, Men, Receiving

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

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• As with the Christian religion, the worst advertisement for Socialism is its adherents.

  George Orwell

  Christian, Political, Advertising

  The Road toWigan Pier ch. 11 (1937)

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