Written 75 years ago, 1984 was George Orwell’s chilling prophecy about the future. And while 1984 has come and gone, his dystopian vision of a government that will do anything to control the narrative is timelier than ever... This 75th Anniversary Edition includes: • A New Introduction by Dolen Perkins-Valdez, author of Take My Hand, winner of the 2023 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work—Fiction • A New Afterword by Sandra Newman, author of Julia: A Retelling of George Orwell’s 1984 “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.” Winston Smith toes the Party line, rewriting history to satisfy the demands of the Ministry of Truth. With each lie he writes, Winston grows to hate the Party that seeks power for its own sake and persecutes those who dare to commit thoughtcrimes. But as he starts to think for himself, Winston can’t escape the fact that Big Brother is always watching... A startling and haunting novel, 1984 creates an imaginary world that is completely convincing from start to finish. No one can deny the novel’s hold on the imaginations of whole generations, or the power of its admonitions—a power that seems to grow, not lessen, with the passage of time. • Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s The Great American Read •

The animals of Manor Farm have revolted and taken over. Upon the death of Old Major, pigs Snowball and Napoleon lead a revolt against Mr. Jones, driving him from the farm. The animals embrace the Seven Commandments of Animalism and life carries on, but they learn that a farm ruled by animals looks more human than ever.

At the height of the Spanish Civil War, George Orwell served from 1936-1937 as a private for the POUM, the Workers' Party of Marxist Unification, an anti-Stalinist communist party. Seriously wounded in action and betrayed by the Communist Party, Orwell and his wife, Eileen, narrowly escaped arrest and returned to England in early summer 1937. Homage to Catalonia is Orwell’s moving account of his experiences during this period, capturing both his commitment to socialist ideals and his criticism of the Communists in Spain. HarperPerennial Classics brings great works of literature to life in digital format, upholding the highest standards in ebook production and celebrating reading in all its forms. Look for more titles in the HarperPerennial Classics collection to build your digital library.

Originally published in 1933, “Down and Out in Paris and London” is a memoir in two parts by English author George Orwell. His first full-length work, it chronicles the time he spent living in poverty in London and Paris, recounting his experiences working casual manual labour jobs and living as a vagabond on the fringes of society. A fascinating and thought-provoking insight into the poverty that exists in the two prosperous cities, “Down and Out in Paris and London” is not to be missed by fans of Orwell's seminal work. Eric Arthur Blair (1903–1950), more commonly known by his pen name George Orwell, was an English journalist, essayist, critic, and novelist most famous for his novel “Nineteen Eighty-Four” (1949) and allegorical novella “Animal Farm” (1945). His work is characterised by an opposition to totalitarianism and biting social commentary, and remains influential in popular culture today. Many of his neologisms have forever entered the English language, including "Thought Police", "Big Brother", "Room 101", "doublethink", "thoughtcrime", and "Newspeak" to name but a few. Other notable works by this author include: "Burmese Days" (1934), "Keep the Aspidistra Flying" (1936), and "Coming Up for Air" (1939). Read & Co. Classics is proudly publishing this memoir now in a new edition complete with the introductory essay "Why I Write".

An early socially critical novel by a master of the genre. Set in 1930s London, Keep the Apsidistra Flying focuses on Gordon Comstock, a bookstore employee who is determined to distance himself from what he sees as a corrupt, money-focused form of life, despite his belief that his poverty will doom him to sadness, and to failure with his girlfriend, Rosemary. Meanwhile, he is working slowly and inconsistently on what he hopes will big his poetic magnum opus, despite the minimal success of his previous writing. The novel is a nuanced investigation of money and class disparity, and probes the question of what actually makes one happy. Penguin Random House Canada is proud to bring you classic works of literature in e-book form, with the highest quality production values. Find more today and rediscover books you never knew you loved.

'...after all, natives were natives - interesting, no doubt, but finally ... an inferior people' Based on his experiences as a policeman in Burma, George Orwell's first novel is set during the end days of British colonialism, when Burma is ruled from Delhi as part of British India. In the fictional district of Kyauktada, based on Kathar, U Po Kyin, a corrupt Burmese magistrate, is planning to destroy the reputation of the Indian Dr Veraswami. The doctor's main protection is his friendship with John Flory who, as a European, has higher prestige. Dr Veraswami wants the privilege of becoming a member of the British club because he thinks that if his standing with the Europeans is good, U Po Kyin's intrigues against him will not prevail. U Po Kyin begins a campaign to persuade the Europeans that the doctor holds disloyal, anti-British opinions, and believes anonymous letters with false stories about the doctor 'will work wonders'.

Before the war! How long shall we go on saying that, I wonder? How long before the answer will be 'Which war?' The approach of the Second World War finds suburban insurance agent George Bowling in a reflective mood. As he thinks back to the sedate Oxfordshire village of his Edwardian boyhood, he contemplates regretfully what has happened to England since then, from the First World War, in which he served, to the seemingly inescapable money-grubbing and mechanization of everyday life in modern London. A lucky windfall allows Bowling to make a secret return to his idyllic birthplace: a fortifying respite, he hopes, from the struggles of life in a modern city on the verge of war. But is there really any going back? Published in 1939, Coming Up for Air is the most accomplished of Orwell's early realist novels, casting light on the development of Orwell's distinctive thinking as a cultural critic. The novel explores many of the themes Orwell later reprised in 1984: nostalgia, memory, and disillusionment in the face of modernity's ills, including industrialisation, capitalist exploitation, and endless war.

An unflinching look at unemployment and life among the working classes in Britain during the Great Depression, The Road to Wigan Pier offers an in-depth examination of socio-economic conditions in the coal-mining communities of England's industrial areas, including detailed analysis of workers' wages, living conditions, and working environments. Orwell was profoundly influenced by his experiences while researching The Road to Wigan Pier and the contrasts with his own comfortable middle-class upbringing; his reactions to working and living conditions and thoughts on how these would be improved under socialism are detailed in the second half of the book. We are delighted to publish this classic book as part of our extensive Classic Library collection. Many of the books in our collection have been out of print for decades, and therefore have not been accessible to the general public. The aim of our publishing program is to facilitate rapid access to this vast reservoir of literature, and our view is that this is a significant literary work, which deserves to be brought back into print after many decades. The contents of the vast majority of titles in the Classic Library have been scanned from the original works. To ensure a high quality product, each title has been meticulously hand curated by our staff. Our philosophy has been guided by a desire to provide the reader with a book that is as close as possible to ownership of the original work. We hope that you will enjoy this wonderful classic work, and that for you it becomes an enriching experience.

George Orwell set out ‘to make political writing into an art’, and to a wide extent this aim shaped the future of English literature – his descriptions of authoritarian regimes helped to form a new vocabulary that is fundamental to understanding totalitarianism. While 1984 and Animal Farm are amongst the most popular classic novels in the English language, this new series of Orwell’s essays seeks to bring a wider selection of his writing on politics and literature to a new readership. Shooting an Elephant, the fifth in the Orwell’s Essays series, tells the story of a police officer in Burma who is called upon to shoot an aggressive elephant. Thought to be loosely based on Orwell’s own experiences in Burma, the tightly written essay weaves together fact and fiction indistinguishably, and leaves the reader contemplating the heavy topic of colonialism, with the words ‘when the white man turns tyrant it is his own freedom that he destroys’ echoing from the page.