Orwell’s 1984 One of the Top Ten Bestsellers of 2015 – In Russia

Multilingual Russia analyst Paul Gobel, citing Russian news media, reports on his blog:

Orwell’s ‘1984’ One of Top Ten Sellers in Russian Book Market in 2015.

Russians purchased more copies of George Orwell’s dystopian novel, “1984,” in 2015 than all but a handful of other books. Some may have bought it because of its warnings about what happens when big media trumps everything else; others in contrast may have seen it as a road map for their future under Vladimir Putin.

Many events of 2015 in Russia fit a 1984 narrative:

Rewriting of History – most alarmingly Vladimir Putin’s insistence that Stalin’s 2 year alliance with Hitler during the Nazi-Soviet Pact was the right thing to do.

Shifting Alliances in Endless Wars – including allying with arch-terrorists like the Taliban and Hamas in the name of fighting terrorism.

Murder with Impunity – like the murder of pro-capitalist, pro-democracy advocate Boris Nemtsov, a friend of Margret Thatcher (“The last time I saw her was at her 80th birthday party [in 2005],” Nemtsov recalled upon Thatcher’s death in 2013. “She approached me and asked me just one question: ‘When will he [Putin] leave?’”).

That the Russians have turned to Orwell is quite telling. They know totalitarianism when they see it.

Update: I forgot to add one more Orwellian aspect of Putin’s regime – the “Ministry of Truth”-like army of Kremlin trolls who are paid by Big Brother to spam comments sections with propaganda. Mostly about how Putin is our friend despite the fact that he supports almost all our enemies, including Iran and their nuclear program. Check out the comments section here to see what I mean.