Nineteen Eighty-Four - Penguin Modern Classics

One of the BBC's '100 Novels That Shaped Our World'

'Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past'

Hiddenaway in the Record Department of the sprawling Ministry of Truth,Winston Smith skilfully rewrites the past to suit the needs of theParty. Yet he inwardly rebels against the totalitarian world he livesin, which demands absolute obedience and controls him through theall-seeing telescreens and the watchful eye of Big Brother, symbolichead of the Party. In his longing for truth and liberty, Smith begins asecret love affair with a fellow-worker Julia, but soon discovers thetrue price of freedom is betrayal.

George Orwell's dystopian masterpiece, Nineteen Eighty-Four is perhaps the most pervasively influential book of the twentieth century.