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The War of the Worlds

by Herbert George Wells

Science Fiction & Fantasy

Added by: Bobby (chicag...

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Description:

Novel by George Orwell was published in 1949 as a warning about the menaces of totalitarianism. The novel is set in an imaginary future world that is dominated by three perpetually warring totalitarian police states. The book's hero, Winston Smith, is a minor party functionary in one of these states. His longing for truth and decency leads him to secretly rebel against the government. Smith has a love affair with a like-minded woman, but they are both arrested by the Thought Police. The ensuing imprisonment, torture, and reeducation of Smith are intended not merely to break him physically or make him submit but to root out his independent mental existence and his spiritual dignity. Orwell's warning of the dangers of totalitarianism made a deep impression on his contemporaries and upon subsequent readers, and the book's title and many of its coinages, such as NEWSPEAK, became bywords for modern political abuses.

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...from the common?" I said. "'Ain't yer just _been_ there?" asked the men. "People seem fair silly about the common, " said the woman over thegate. "What's it all abart?""Haven't you heard of the men from Mars?" said I; "the creaturesfrom Mars?""Quite enough, " said the woman over the gate. "Thenks"; and allthree of them laughed. I felt foolish and angry. I tried and found I could not tell themwhat I had seen. They laughed again at my broken sentences. "You'll hear more yet, " I said, and went on to my home. I startled my wife at the doorway, so haggard was I. I went intothe dining room, sat down, drank some wine, and so soon as I couldcollect myself sufficiently I told her the things I had seen. Thedinner, which was a cold one, had already been served, and remainedneglected on the table while I told my story. "There is one thing, " I said, to allay the fears I had aroused;"they are the most sluggish things I ever saw crawl. They may keepthe pit and kill people who come near them, but...