Published 70 years ago in 1949 and bearing a futuristic title that is now itself 35 years in the past, George Orwell’s classic 1984 retains its uncanny relevance and power. The story of a socialized England that is advancing Communist ideas to some of their most unsettling misuses, the novel shines with intelligent satire, riotous revelation, and a defiantly personal narrative that provides heartbreaking counterpoint to getting lost in and crushed by the political machine.

Before my intuition directed me to this great book, I had been catching up on Marx, reading his incisive ideas about Capitalist fallout: the deadening alienation of the working class from the labor it performs, the predictable momentum of profiteering toward clandestine oligarchies, the regrettable inhumanity of the resulting System in every detail and in general. It was not by clear logical reasoning that as my next reading choice I cracked the spine on 1984, but the sequential fit should be apparent. Marx and Orwell are like opposing bookends around society as a whole and where it is going.

Would I recommend 1984? So many people encounter it for the first time in secondary school. Who knows if they actually read it then? Probably better if they don’t, because there is a level of sophistication to this book that overall is probably lost on an audience under the age of 30. You need to live and struggle inside challenging economic realities as an adult for a while to lay the best foundation for these pages. Possessing that experience, readers will deeply savor the howling lampoon of a world in which individuality is entirely criminal and politics is forced religion.

Orwell chases those outcomes to impressive lengths. He delivers not only a riveting narrative that elicits deep sympathy from the reader, but while doing so, also peppers in abundant discursive material pertaining to the social fabric on an instructive level. For instance, there is a long section nearly halfway into the book when the protagonist Winston Smith reads a secret manual about the intentions of The Party, printed verbatim, as if an expose on the nature of Power. The novel also contains a long appendix, addressing in staggering detail the re-engineering of spoken language for the purpose of uniformity as NewSpeak.

Is it mission critical that you read every word of those deeply didactic portions of the book? No, but for now entertain the idea that surprisingly you may want to. They round out the grim portrait of who and what Big Brother is, why and how he functions and exists, what the charms of his benevolent protection are all about. The explanations seem less like a lesson in history than a scathing indictment of the present. We live in a world of bank bailouts, fixed elections, dismissive accusations of fake news, rampant surveillance, and profound anxiety and indifference. The White House overly serves the interests of the wealthiest 1%, dependent on it for candidacy. Is Big Brother still watching? If so, he must like what he sees. These social norms are only normal in a fascist ascendancy.