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Title: Fascinating, but badly titled
Review: Had Reznikov called this book something more like "Behind Orwell's Newspeak: the Societal Truth of 1984," he would have sold more copy and been more accurate.This book reads like a short masters' thesis on a fascinating, but very narrow subject. ... Between the lines lies Reznikov's well-deserved worship of the man who foresaw (at least in lingual terms) the rise and fall of the Third Reich and the Soviet Union. Also, Reznikov suggests (again, between the lines) that, just as Tolkien originally conceived Middle Earth in order to create a separate reality where characters could speak Elvish, Orwell's greatest fictional work, 1984, probably grew out of his desire to display his theoretical language, Newspeak.This book is a must for those who love Orwell and 1984; it will help you to understand both better. The book is dry in subject, and a bit repetitive, but wet in enthusiasm. Reznikov enjoys his concept and may well have a future in literary non-fiction beyond Orwell.
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