1984 by George Orwell

I first read George Orwell’s 1984 in 2024, and it became a starting point for my interest in governance, autocracy, and the moral limits of political power. What affected me most was not simply the censorship imposed by the Party, but its ability to make citizens distrust their own memories and suppress their private beliefs. Winston’s world showed me that authoritarianism can extend beyond controlling public speech. It can weaken the individual’s capacity to recognise and preserve an inner truth.

This idea later connected with my analysis of Mary Warren in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible for school. Like Winston, Mary knows that the official account imposed by authority is false, yet fear prevents her from sustaining her own version of events. Orwell, therefore, led me to question when political authority becomes morally illegitimate, particularly when it claims the power to determine what citizens must accept as true.

I do not fully agree with O’Brien’s claim that power is always pursued purely for its own sake. Political leaders may initially seek power for public purposes. However, the desire to retain power can encourage censorship, surveillance, and the suppression of dissent. These questions have remained relevant to me while living in China and examining the deterioration and concentration of political power in the United States, India, and other societies.