BBC Archive

≠BBC ArchivesGeorge Orwell, one of the most perspicacious and influential authors of the 20^th century, died 75 years ago this week,

As an old BBC hack, I love to read the daily online BBC in History newsletter , which today commemorates the event. Here’s the newsreader’s script of the announcement of his death in 1960.

BBC Archives

The online newsletter  says that his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four shaped the way we think and talk about the role of surveillance and the power of the state: “Terms and concepts used in the dystopian novel – such as ‘Thought Police’, ‘doublethink’ and ‘untruth’– have passed into common use. “Public figures continue to reference Nineteen Eighty-Four to warn against the consequences of technology. In 2021, Microsoft’s president Brad Smith told the BBC’s Panorama programme that life as depicted in the novel “could come to pass” if lawmakers failed to protect the public against AI.”

Big Brother is watching you”. The £2 commemorative coin issued by Britain’s Royal Mint to mark Orwell’s death,

Totatarianism thrives through fear and false news, and through the suppression of facts and ideas. Come and tell us what you think in the relaxed atmosphere of the Watermill — and enjoy enlightened opinion and courteous debate under the dappled shade of the Watermill’s vine verandah.