George Orwell citations
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George Orwell [dʒɔːdʒ ˈɔːwel], nom de plume d’Eric Arthur Blair, né le 25 juin 1903 à Motihari pendant la période du Raj britannique et mort le 21 janvier 1950 à Londres, est un écrivain, essayiste et journaliste britannique.

Son œuvre porte la marque de ses engagements, qui trouvent eux-mêmes pour une large part leur source dans l'expérience personnelle de l'auteur : contre l'impérialisme britannique, après son engagement de jeunesse comme représentant des forces de l'ordre colonial en Birmanie ; pour la justice sociale et le socialisme libertaire,, après avoir observé et partagé les conditions d'existence des classes laborieuses à Londres et à Paris ; contre les totalitarismes nazi et soviétique, après sa participation à la guerre d'Espagne. Déçu par tous les pouvoirs et mouvements politiques, il s'est qualifié lui-même de tory anarchist .

Témoin de son époque, Orwell est dans les années 1930 et 1940 chroniqueur, critique littéraire et romancier. De cette production variée, les deux œuvres au succès le plus durable sont deux textes publiés après la Seconde Guerre mondiale : La Ferme des animaux et surtout 1984, roman dans lequel il crée le concept de Big Brother, depuis passé dans le langage courant de la critique des techniques modernes de surveillance et de contrôle des individus. L'adjectif « orwellien » est également fréquemment utilisé en référence à l'univers totalitaire imaginé par cet écrivain anglais. Wikipedia  

✵ 25. juin 1903 – 21. janvier 1950
George Orwell photo
George Orwell: 500   citations 4   J'aime

George Orwell citations célèbres

“Tous les animaux sont égaux mais certains sont plus égaux que d'autres.”

All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others.
en
La Ferme des animaux, 1945

Citations sur les animaux de George Orwell

“1. Tout deuxpattes est un ennemi.
2. Tout quatrepattes ou tout volatile, un ami.
3. Nul animal ne portera de vêtements
4. Nul animal ne dormira dans un lit.
5. Nul animal ne boira d'alcool.
6. Nul animal ne tuera un autre animal.
7. Tous les animaux sont égaux.”

en
Les Sept Commandements (originaux)
Livre La Ferme des animaux, George Orwell, Gallimard, 1984, 30, 2, 2-07-037516-1, Jean Queval, 1945, Folio, fr
La Ferme des animaux, 1945
Original: 1. Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
2. Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
3. No animal shall wear clothes.
4. No animal shall sleep in a bed.
5. No animal shall drink alcohol.
6. No animal shall kill any other animal.
7. All animals are equal.

“Dehors, les yeux des animaux allaient du cochon à l'homme et de l'homme au cochon, et de nouveau du cochon à l'homme; mais déjà il était impossible de distinguer l'un de l'autre.”

The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
en
La Ferme des animaux, 1945

“Car l'Homme est notre seul véritable ennemi. Qu'on le supprime, et voici extirpée la racine du mal. Plus à trimer sans relâche! Plus de meurt-la-faim!
L'homme est la seule créature qui consomme sans produire. Il ne donne pas de lait, il ne pond pas d'œufs, il est trop débile pour pousser la charrue, bien trop lent pour attraper un lapin. Pourtant le voici le suzerain de tous les animaux. Il distribue les tâches entre eux, mais ne leur donne en retour que la maigre pitance qui les maintient en vie. Puis il garde pour lui le surplus.”

Man is the only real enemy we have. Remove Man from the scene, and the root cause of hunger and overwork is abolished for ever. Man is the only creature that consumes without producing. He does not give milk, he does not lay eggs, he is too weak to pull the plough, he cannot run fast enough to catch rabbits. Yet he is lord of all the animals. He sets them to work, he gives back to them the bare minimum that will prevent them from starving, and the rest he keeps for himself.
en
Partie du discours de Sage l'Ancien
La Ferme des animaux, 1945

George Orwell Citations

“Les seules autobiographies dignes de foi sont celles qui dévoilent quelque chose de honteux. Un homme qui se dépeint sous un jour favorable est probablement en train de mentir, car toute existence, vue de l'intérieur, n'est qu'une longue suite d'échecs.”

Autobiography is only to be trusted when it reveals something disgraceful. A man who gives a good account of himself is probably lying, since any life when viewed from the inside is simply a series of defeats.
en
L'immunité artistique, quelques notes sur Salvador Dali, 1944

“L'ancienne vie a bel et bien disparu, et c'est perdre son temps que de chercher à la retrouver. […] Jonas ne retournera jamais dans le ventre de la baleine.”

The old life's finished, and to go about looking for it is just waste of time. [...] You can't put Jonah back into the whale.
en
Un peu d'air frais, 1939

“Le désir était un crime de la pensée.”

1984

George Orwell: Citations en anglais

“That rifle on the wall of the labourer's cottage or working class flat is the symbol of democracy. It is our job to see that it stays there.”

"Don't Let Colonel Blimp Ruin the Home Guard" article for the Evening Standard, 8 January 1941
Contexte: Even as it stands, the Home Guard could only exist in a country where men feel themselves free. The totalitarian states can do great things, but there is one thing they cannot do: they cannot give the factory-worker a rifle and tell him to take it home and keep it in his bedroom. THAT RIFLE HANGING ON THE WALL OF THE WORKING-CLASS FLAT OR LABOURER'S COTTAGE, IS THE SYMBOL OF DEMOCRACY. IT IS OUR JOB TO SEE THAT IT STAYS THERE.

“To enforce the lies of the present, it is necessary to erase the truths of the past.”

George Orwell livre 1984

Attributed to Orwell by Keith Olbermann on MSNBC (27 September 2006), this seems to be a paraphrase of some of the statements in Nineteen Eighty-Four.
Misattributed
Source: 1984

“Surely, comrades, you don't want Jones back?”

George Orwell livre La Ferme des animaux

Source: Animal Farm

“What happens to you here is forever.”

George Orwell livre 1984

Source: 1984

“Within certain limits, it is actually true that the less money you have, the less you worry.”

George Orwell livre Down and Out in Paris and London

Source: Down and out in Paris and London (1933), Ch. 4
Source: Down and Out in Paris and London
Contexte: For, when you are approaching poverty, you make one discovery which outweighs some of the others. You discover boredom and mean complications and the beginnings of hunger, but you also discover the great redeeming feature of poverty: the fact that it annihilates the future. Within certain limits, it is actually true that the less money you have, the less you worry.

“He was an embittered atheist (the sort of atheist who does not so much disbelieve in God as personally dislike Him), and took a sort of pleasure in thinking that human affairs would never improve.”

George Orwell livre Down and Out in Paris and London

Source: Down and out in Paris and London (1933), Ch. 30
Source: Down and Out in Paris and London
Contexte: He was an embittered atheist (the sort of atheist who does not so much disbelieve in God as personally dislike Him), and took a sort of pleasure in thinking that human affairs would never improve. Sometimes, he said, when sleeping on the Embankment, it had consoled him to look up at Mars or Jupiter and think that there were probably Embankment sleepers there. He had a curious theory about this. Life on earth, he said, is harsh because the planet is poor in the necessities of existence. Mars, with its cold climate and scanty water, must be far poorer, and life correspondingly harsher. Whereas on earth you are merely imprisoned for stealing sixpence, on Mars you are probably boiled alive. This thought cheered Bozo, I do not know why. He was a very exceptional man.

“A lunatic is just a minority of one.”

George Orwell livre 1984

Variante: Perhaps a lunatic was simply a minority of one.
Source: 1984

“At normal times it is deeply dishonest. All the papers that matter live off their advertisements, and the advertisers exercise an indirect censorship over news.”

George Orwell Why I Write

"The Lion and the Unicorn" (1941)
Source: Why I Write
Contexte: Is the English press honest or dishonest? At normal times it is deeply dishonest. All the papers that matter live off their advertisements, and the advertisers exercise an indirect censorship over news. Yet I do not suppose there is one paper in England that can be straightforwardly bribed with hard cash. In the France of the Third Republic all but a very few of the newspapers could notoriously be bought over the counter like so many pounds of cheese.

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