- “Dishonesty Is The Second-Best Policy and Other Rules to Live By” by David Mitchell
- “Michael Palin In Venezuela” by Michael Palin
- “Happiness: Lessons From A New Science” by Richard Layard
- “The People on Platform 5” by Clare Pooley
- “Encyclopaedia of Narrow Gauge Railways of Great Britain and Ireland” by Thomas Middlemiss
- “Moscow Coup: The Death of the Soviet System” by Martin Sixsmith
- “The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged Thirteen and Three-Quarters” by Sue Townsend
- “The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole” by Sue Townsend
- “Adrian Mole: The Collected Poems” by Sue Townsend
- “How To Live Like A Stoic” by Tom Hodgkinson
- “The Sacred Diary of Adrian Plass aged 37 3/4” by Adrian Plass
- “This Present Darkness” by Frank Peretti
- “Don’t Sleep, There Are Snakes” by Daniel Everett
- “Brutal Scotland” by Simon Phipps
- “Idler XXX: Thirty Years of The Idler, A Visual History” by Tom Hodgkinson
- “We” by Yevgeny Zamyatin
- “British Railways Mark 1 Coaches” by Keith Parkin
- “Meditations” by Marcus Aurelius
- “The Story of Railways” by Richard Bowood, illustrated by Robert Ayton (Ladybird)
- “Riders” by Jilly Cooper
- “The Dark Half” by Stephen King
- “Everything In Color” by Stephanie Stalvey
- “Final Destination: Riding Britain’s Trains to the End of the Line” by Nige Tassell
- “Willie, Willie, Harry, Stee” by Charlie Higson
- “Bill Bailey’s Remarkable Guide to Happiness” by Bill Bailey
- “West Highland Landscape” by Colin Baxter
- “How God Becomes Real: Kindling The Presence of Invisible Others” by T.M. Luhrmann
- “On The Slow Train Again” by Michael Williams
- “A Writer At War: Vasily Grossman with the Red Army” by Vasily Grossman, Antony Beevor (editor) and Luba Vinogradova (translator)
- “Nineteen Eighty-Four” by George Orwell
Date started: 4th November 2026
Date finished: 14th November 2026
4.5/5 stars
I’ve probably read this novel more times than any other I’ve read in my life. I discovered it many years ago when I studied it for GCSE English Literature, and it’s about the only book we studied that really made an impression on me. I’ve turned into something of a Nineteen Eighty-Four geek since then, and I can quote huge chunks of the text from memory. I was prompted to read it again after recently seeing a new stage adaptation of the book.
Unfortunately, the play wasn’t very good, taking rather serious liberties with the plot and putting what felt like too much of a 2020s spin on the novel. For all its faults – and there are some – it needs to be borne in mind that the novel was written in the 1940s, and it’s hardly surprising some attitudes of the day loom large in it. Attempts to modernise it, or inject it with contemporary values, annoy me somewhat. Let’s stick to what it actually says, as it’s a classic that doesn’t need reinterpretation (see my thoughts on “Julia”, the “feminist retelling” that’s a huge pile of garbage in my opinion).
I don’t think it’s necessary to summarise the plot in too much detail, I’m sure you’ve got some idea of it already. It’s the ultimate dystopian novel, a story of a totalitarian regime that goes to extraordinary and brutal lengths to avoid being overthrown, and has absolutely no tolerance for dissent of any kind. It all revolves around the existence of Winston Smith, a member of the Outer Party who ends up asking too many questions, and engages in a doomed affair with Julia, a younger woman who takes her pleasures where she can find them. Both of them end up in the hands of the Thought Police at the end of the novel, but we don’t find out much about what happens to Julia afterwards. Winston ends up an empty husk of who he was, with all his rebellion purged out of him.
The book has been incredibly influential, and although it has flaws, it proved incredibly perceptive and almost prophetic. If you look at regimes like North Korea, they’ve almost used this novel as a textbook. Orwell was incredibly perceptive about the power of technology to monitor and enslave people, and we’re really seeing that now as digital tools and AI hoover up data and build profiles on us. He really understood the nature of those who want to control, manipulate and bully the population into doing their bidding, and it’s some of the best writing you’ll find on these subjects.
As I’ve said, it’s not perfect – there’s a few inconsistencies and things that don’t quite make sense in the novel, but they’re things I can generally excuse. Overall, it creates an ominous and oppressive atmosphere that leaps off the page very convincingly. I love Orwell’s style of writing, as he uses very efficient and lean prose to create fantastic descriptions. The major problems, I suppose, are that Winston Smith is not a pleasant character, and some of his attitudes reflect Orwell’s quite closely, mainly in having a very sexist attitude. Unfortunately, Orwell clearly didn’t like women very much, and although Julia is an impressive character in some ways, she ultimately comes across as quite weak and not particularly intelligent. This is a common theme throughout Orwell’s writing, although I think this may be more a product of the era it was written in than anything deliberately misogynistic. I can understand why people were drawn to the concept of a feminist retelling, but as I’ve written elsewhere, I don’t think it works or adds anything to the story. I think it’s important to understand the world the book was written in when examining its flaws.
I’ve knocked off half a star for these flaws – I think it would otherwise easily be a five-star book. If you haven’t read it, I strongly urge you to do so.