Nineteen Eighty-Four (or 1984) is a dystopian novel by the English writer George Orwell, published in 1949. The book tells the story of Winston Smith and his degradation by the totalitarian state in which he lives.
Along with Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, and Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, it is among the most famous and cited dystopias in literature.
It has been translated into 62 languages and has left a profound impression upon the English language itself. Nineteen Eighty-Four, its terminology and its author have become bywords when discussing privacy and state-security issues. The term "Orwellian" has come to describe actions or organizations reminiscent of the totalitarian society depicted in the novel, and the phrase "Big Brother is watching you" has come to mean any act of surveillance that is perceived as invasive.
Nineteen Eighty-Four has, at times, been seen as revolutionary and politically dangerous and therefore was banned by many libraries in various countries, even in countries besides those controlled by totalitarian regimes.
The novel was chosen by TIME Magazine as one of the 100 best English-language novels from 1923 to the present.