La Jornada: In 1984, Orwell “masterfully explains the Trump phenomenon”

The novel 1984, by the British George Orwell (1903-1950), “masterfully explains the Donald Trump phenomenon,” noted the writer Eduardo Rabasa in an interview with The Day, regarding the recent launch of the first translation of the work made in Mexico, by the independent publishing house Sexto Piso.

The translator of this classic of literature and founding member of the Mexican label considered that he is not the only one who perceives this relationship. “The first time Trump won (November 2016), the title went to first place in Amazon sales” in his country. This increase predicted a “literally Orwellian” reality.

He added that the work is more eloquent for contemporary readers than for those who received it in 1949, the year of its publication, since almost seven decades before the magnate’s arrival to the presidency of the United States, Orwell already defined aspects such as “the use of hatred, insult, the degradation of language or the generation of a state of hysteria among citizens towards a fictitious enemy.”

the novel

Towards the end of the first half of the 20th century, George Orwell envisioned the existence of a dystopian future, not far from our reality, in which the people in power controlled every aspect of their citizens’ lives.

In this context, Winston Smith, the protagonist, a bureaucrat at the Ministry of Truth, lives his professional life in charge of a mission: editing the official history. However, the society of Oceania, where the plot takes place, not only consumes manipulated information, but, little by little, it is forced to use a new language, a simplification of the previous one, which facilitates and pigeonholes all communication capacity.

Power also imprisons the privacy of the inhabitants of Oceania, always monitored by the omnipresent figure of Big Brother, leader of the Party, through a “telescreen” device, which simultaneously functions as a television and a camera.

Through this instrument, “not only do they send them propaganda, but they watch them all the time. Very similar to what happens now with social networks and cameras. In some way they watch us all the time. The interesting thing is that there (in the novel) it was a party that watched the people; instead, we are the ones who turn on the camera, record what we do, share everything we do, as if in some way we were watching ourselves,” Rabasa said.

The translation

Unlike the translations of other publishers, that of Eduardo Rabasa (Sexto Piso) was born with a single objective: to bring and facilitate the reading of this title to the Mexican public. His work, he explained, differs from publications of Spanish or Argentine origin that “greatly accentuate colloquialisms.” Furthermore, due to the relevance of the Sixth Floor project, the publishing house was a beneficiary, in 2024, of the Translation Support Program, the Creation Support System and Cultural Projects.

The work was not easy. The very nature of the novel posed a challenge for Eduardo Rabasa, since George Orwell, passionate about language, played 1984 a demonstration of the extraordinary mastery he had over his language and the precision with which he conceived each word.

Knowledge of the English language is not a coincidence, since the writer is known for having practiced not only the genre of the novel, but also essays and journalism. Rabasa further explained that the author of Farm Animal He was influenced by the work of people such as William Shakespeare, Henry Miller, Rudyard Kipling, William Blake and Jonathan Swift. He wrote about them, highlighted them and praised them; However, “even in those exercises of admiration there was always a very critical reading.”