Political Quotes by George Orwell

“In our age there is no such thing as 'keeping out of politics.' All issues are political issues…”

— George Orwell

The four great motives for writing prose are sheer egoism, esthetic enthusiasm, historical impulse, and political purpose.

— George Orwell

You must be an intellectual. A normal person would never believe a thing like that.

— George Orwell

In our time political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible.

— George Orwell

The opinion that art should have nothing to do with politics is itself a political attitude.

— George Orwell

“It was not desirable that the proles should have strong political feelings. All”

— George Orwell

The typical socialist... a prim little man with a white-collar job, usually a secret teetotaler and often with vegetarian leanings.

— George Orwell

To accept civilization as it is practically means accepting decay.

— George Orwell

[Political] prose consists less and less of words chosen for the sake of their meaning, and more and more of phrases tacked…

— George Orwell

[T]he more one is conscious of one's political bias, the more chance one has of acting politically without sacrificing one's aesthetic and…

— George Orwell

Power-worship blurs political judgment because it leads, almost unavoidably, to the belief that present trends will continue. Whoever is winning at the…

— George Orwell

In my opinion nothing has contributed more to the corruption of the original idea of socialism as the belief that Russia is…

— George Orwell

Most revolutionaries are potential Tories, because they imagine that everything can be put right by altering the shape of society; once that…

— George Orwell

All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides…

— George Orwell

Good novels are not written by orthodoxy-sniffers, nor by people who are conscience-stricken about their own orthodoxy. Good novels are written by…

— George Orwell

Political chaos is connected with the decay of language... one can probably bring about some improvement by starting at the verbal end.

— George Orwell

Political writing in our time consists almost entirely of prefabricated phrases bolted together like the pieces of a child's Meccano set. It…

— George Orwell

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible... Thus, political language has to consist largely of…

— George Orwell

“Modern writing at its worst does not consist in picking out words for the sake of their meaning and inventing images in…

— George Orwell

Winston worked in the RECORDS DEPARTMENT (a single branch of the Ministry of Truth) editing and writing for The Times. He dictated…

— George Orwell

But the problems of perpetuating a hierarchical society go deeper than this. There are only four ways in which a ruling group…

— George Orwell

Where this age differs from those immediately preceding it is that a liberal intelligentsia is lacking. Bully-worship, under various disguises, has become…

— George Orwell

To say "I accept" in an age like our own is to say that you accept concentration-camps, rubber truncheons, Hitler, Stalin, bombs,…

— George Orwell

“In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defence of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in…

— George Orwell

A mass of Latin words falls upon the facts like soft snow, blurring the outline and covering up all the details. The…

— George Orwell

“A Party member is expected to have no private emotions and no respites from enthusiasm. He is supposed to live in a…

— George Orwell

“All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred and schizophrenia.”

— George Orwell

A Socialist United States of Europe seems to me the only worth-while political objective today

— George Orwell

Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.

— George Orwell

And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history…

— George Orwell

“Political language . . . is designed to make its lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure…

— George Orwell

“Political language -- and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists -- is designed to make…

— George Orwell

Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make…

— George Orwell

It reminded us that propaganda in some form or other lurks in every book, that every work of art has a meaning…

— George Orwell

But you could not have pure love or pure lust nowadays. No emotion was pure, because everything was mixed up with fear…

— George Orwell

Modern English, especially written English, is full of bad habits which spread by imitation and which can be avoided if one is…

— George Orwell

“It was curious to think that the sky was the same for everybody, in Eurasia or Eastasia as well as here. And…

— George Orwell

Day by day and almost minute by minute the past was brought up to date. In this way every prediction made by…

— George Orwell

Using the word ‘political’ in the widest possible sense. Desire to push the world in a certain direction, to alter other peoples’…

— George Orwell

It is difficult for a statesman who still has a political future to reveal everything that he knows: and in a profession…

— George Orwell