The canon of the dystopian genre. G. Orwell’s 1984. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess as a cult exploration of the nature of evil.

A dystopia (alternatively, cacotopia, kakotopia or anti-utopia) is a fictional society that is the antithesis of utopia. It is usually characterized by an oppressive social control, such as an authoritarian or totalitarian government.

Some academic circles distinguish between anti-utopia and dystopia. A dystopia does not pretend to be good, while an anti-utopia appears to be utopian or was intended to be so, but a fatal flaw or other factor has destroyed or twisted the intended utopian world or concept, as is evidenced with Ingsoc in George Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World.

The first known use of the term dystopia appeared in a parliamentary speech by John Stuart Mill in 1868. His knowledge of Greek suggests that he was referring to a bad place, rather than simply the opposite of Utopia. The Greek prefix "dys" ("δυσ-") prefix signifies "ill", "bad" or "abnormal"; Greek "topos" ("τόπος") meaning "place"; and Greek "ou-" ("ου") meaning "not". Thus, Utopia means "nowhere", and is a pun on "Eutopia" meaning "happy place" - the prefix "eu" means "well".

George orwell 1903-1950

Eric Arthur Blair, better known by the pen name George Orwell, was a British author and journalist. Noted as a novelist, as a critic and as a political and cultural commentator, Orwell is among the most widely admired English-language essayists of the 20th century. He is best known for two novels critical of fascism, communism and totalitarianism written and published towards the end of his life: Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four.

Animal Farm (1945) is the story of the formation of a commune among a group of intelligent farm-animals. The idea for forming a socialistic commune is first put forward by the pigs Napoleon and Snowball. (Each of the different kinds of animal in the novel is symbolic for different demographic groups: the naive but hard-working horse represents the ignorant lower-classes; the conniving pigs represent the educated upper crust.) The pigs suggest that they need to overthrow their oppressive master—the human proprietor of the farm—so that they can be liberated, living and working together as perfect equals and fulfilling their maximum potential.

At first, following a brief revolution, the animal-commune runs swimmingly. As the novel progresses, however, the pigs (who, as the most intelligent creatures on the farm tend to be the ones to whom the others defer) become corrupt and abandon their utopian ideals for their own selfish ends. This is best epitomized by the transformation of "All animals are equal," the motto on which the commune was founded, into "All animals are equal; but some animals are more equal than others." By the novel's end, the commune has become an outright dictatorship.

Nineteen Eighty-Four (commonly written as 1984) is an anti-utopian novel published in 1949. The book tells the story of Winston Smith and his degradation by the totalitarian state in which he lives.

Written while Orwell was dying and based on the work of the Russian author Yevgeny Zamyatin, it is a chilling depiction of how the power of the state could come to dominate the lives of individuals through cultural conditioning. Perhaps the most powerful science fiction novel of the twentieth century, this apocalyptic satire shows with grim conviction how Winston Smith’s individual personality is wiped out and how he is recreated in the Party’s image until he does not just obey but even loves Big Brother. Some critics have related Winston Smith’s sufferings to those Orwell underwent at preparatory school, experiences he wrote about just before 1984. Orwell maintained that the book was written with the explicit intention “to alter other people’s idea of the kind of society they should strive after.”

Along with Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, and Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, it is among the most famous and cited dystopias in literature.

It has been translated into 62 languages and has left a profound impression upon the English language itself. Nineteen Eighty-Four, its terminology and its author have become bywords when discussing privacy and state-security issues. The term "Orwellian" has come to describe actions or organizations reminiscent of the totalitarian society depicted in the novel.

Nineteen Eighty-Four has, at times, been seen as revolutionary and politically dangerous and therefore was banned by many libraries in various countries, not mentioning totalitarian regimes.

Originally Orwell titled the book The Last Man in Europe, but his publisher, Frederic Warburg, suggested a change to assist in the book's marketing. Orwell did not object to this suggestion. The reasons for selection of this particular year are not known. Orwell may have only switched the last two digits of the year in which he wrote the book. Alternatively, he may have been alluding to the centenary of the Fabian Society, a socialist organization founded in 1884. The allusion may have also been to Jack London's novel The Iron Heel (in which the power of a political movement reaches its height in 1984), to G. K. Chesterton's The Napoleon of Notting Hill (also set in that year), or to a poem by his wife, Eileen O'Shaughnessy, called "End of the Century, 1984". A final supposed explanation is that his original re-titling was to be 1980; however, with his illness the book was taking a long time to write, so he felt obliged to push the story further and further into the future.

The novel focuses on Winston Smith, who stands, seemingly alone, against the corrupt reality of his world: hence the work's original working name The Last Man in Europe. Although the storyline is unified, it could be described as having three parts (it has been published in three parts by some publishers). The first part deals with the world of Nineteen Eighty-Four as seen through the eyes of Winston; the second part deals with Winston's forbidden sexual relationship with Julia and his eagerness to rebel against the Party; and the third part deals with Winston's capture by the Party and his imprisonment in the Ministry of Love.

The world described in Nineteen Eighty-Four parallels the Stalinist Soviet Union and Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany. There are thematic similarities: the betrayed revolution, with which Orwell had famously dealt in Animal Farm; the subordination of individuals to "the Party"; and the rigorous distinction between the Inner Party, Outer Party, and everyone else. There are also direct parallels of the activities within the society: leader worship, such as that towards Big Brother, who can be compared to dictators like Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler; Joycamps, which are a reference to concentration camps or gulags; Thought Police, a reference to the Gestapo or NKVD; daily exercise reminiscent of Nazi propaganda movies; and the Youth League, reminiscent of Hitler Youth or Little Octobrists/Young Pioneers.