George Orwell, Newspeak

Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought?

Newspeak was George Orwell’s fictional language, invented for the book 1984.

It was created by the totalitarian state Oceania, and allowed only a narrow range of very specific words in an attempt to control freedom of expression and thought.

Ironically, many of the words created by Orwell to convey how a regime can repress a population, are now in common use today as a form of self-expression.

The Background to Newspeak in ‘1984’

Any form of thought which differed from that of the governing party – Oceania – was classified as ‘thoughtcrime’

In order to reduce freedom of expression which could lead to ‘thoughtcrime’, the English language was changed:

• No antonyms – ‘bad’ becomes ‘ungood’, ‘warm’ becomes ‘uncold’…etc
• No synonyms – words like ‘great’, ‘excellent’, ‘lovely’ all disappear and are described by  ‘good’
• No comparatives or superlatives – there are no words for ‘better’ or ‘best’; ‘better’ becomes ‘plus good’ and ‘best’ becomes ‘doubleplus good’
• Limited adverbs and adjectives – to create an adjective, you add the suffix –ful to a noun (e.g. instead of ‘rapid’, ‘quick’, or ‘fast’, you say ‘speedful’) and to create an adverb, you add the suffix -wise; e.g. ‘quickly’ or ‘rapidly’ becomes ‘speedwise’
• Constrained tenses – the suffix –ed is the only way to change a word to the past tense; e.g. the irregular past tenses drank or ran no longer exist, becoming drinked and runned

Words which have entered the English Language from ‘1984’

Published in 1949 at the conclusion of the 2nd World War and the start of the Cold War, the book ‘1984’ carried chilling reminders of the propensity of rulers to re-write history in their own image, using language for propaganda and control purposes.

Consequently, a number of the words invented for the book, warning of the dangers of centralised control, have become popularised today:

• Big Brother
• Newspeak
• Thoughtcrime
• Thoughtpolice
• Unperson

The very concept of objective truth is fading out of this world. Lies will pass into history