[Boomer]

I taught 1984 several times, including in 1984.

There was nothing special about Orwell's choice of the year. According to standard sources, Orwell wrote most of the book in 1948 and they wanted to give it a short title so the numbers were simply flipped.

It was not difficult to control the Proles. They were saturated with violent movies in order to desensitize them to violence -- domestic and global.

There were fake lotteries -- well, once in a while somebody real would win a small amount. The lotteries helped to distract the Proles with some kind of pathetic hope.

And there was gin.....The protagonist Winston Smith swallows that gin "like a dose of medicine." -- The gin was said to give the sensation of being "hit on the back of the head with a rubber club." Winston drank that easy-to-come-by gin to make his world "look more cheerful."

Always, when we finished a book, the final assignment was an essay. For 1984, the students were to look around their current world and compare what they saw in reality to what they saw in Orwell's fiction.

That was a long time ago. I have wondered what it would be like to teach 1984 now.....and to assign that essay.......shiver....shudder.....

I just remembered the bulletin board I made for my classroom when we read 1984. In big, scary letters, it said, "What is in your Room 101?" -- I was sure glad that did not happen to be my classroom number.

.........And then there was that other book......the one where everybody was addicted to big screens and could not think for themselves.........

Dystopia happens?

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PS: I was not off topic -- in case the topic police are present. That was about required HS reading.

Boomer the Requirer