"1984" written in an Axis victory TL

This is something I have been wondering about: unless of course you go the silly path of the sea-mammal-that-must-not-be-mentioned or assume that he accidentally gets killed under some other circumstances, chances are that George Orwell would survive World War II even if the Axis wins. The best POD I can think of there at the moment, perhaps, is that Britain agrees to an armistice in 1940 following the Dunkirk disaster. However, you are free to chose a different scenario so long as Britain doesn't get invaded. So, here's the question for you: would Orwell write "1984" or a similar work in such an ATL? What would be different in such a work?
 
Any credible Axis victory would involve a "draw" with the United States and Britain along with it. The domain of "Oceaina," the setting of 1984, is still intact. The story implies that a single power dominates all of Eurasia, eliminating the split along the Iron Curtain.

Since Nazism and communism were both totalitarian dictatorial systems, it would not have mattered which side prevailed and the story might not have changed much.
 
The story could be exactly the same.

Just change a few references from socialism and communism into references to nazism/fascism and vice versa

Ingsoc => Ingnaz
 

Thande

Donor
An interesting question.

1984 obviously draws on Orwell's experience as a journalist and war broadcaster with totalitarian states - primarily the USSR and secondarily Nazi Germany, I would say - but this is, I would argue, not the primary influence or inspiration for the book. The setting of the book in Britain is not simply an "it could happen here" gimmick or a Red Dawn-style "audiences only care if it's happening to their own country". No.

The primary inspiration for the book in my view is Britain itself during the war, and to a lesser extent afterwards. I argue that the 1940s were a dark time for democracy and liberty in more ways than simply 'there are some nasty totalitarian powers over there invading people': they were being eroded at home. Britain had not held an election since 1935, and the national government meant that all the parties were united, with disagreement being stifled and naysayers like the Independent Labour Party being lambasted as traitors. Ideology was swept aside as irrelevant, but the government possessed control over broadcasting and every facet of public life. Complaining about rationing, for example, would be letting the side down, and propaganda about eating less and eating poorer food being one's patriotic duty was widely circulated. (My grandfather maintained to his death that it actually made him prefer powdered egg to the real thing...)

America, viewed until recently as the chief torchbearer of democracy and liberty throughout the world (regardless of whether those things were viewed as positives or not) was also stuck in a less intense but nonetheless precarious situation. If FDR's health had been better he could have become president-for-life with his personal popularity combined with his electoral machine sewing up victories. The AmeriRight nowadays, shrill though they are, are right to point to FDR's reign as the time when the power of the federal government and the presidential executive unequivocably rendered the states irrelevant. Government power was supreme everywhere for the first time.

My point is that when Orwell conceived 1984, it seemed as though democracy could be on the way out throughout the entire world, and it was this that informed the idea that if every state could degrade to a propaganda-spewing totalitarian dictatorship run by only a minority elite who have any idea of an objective truth, then could those elites establish contact and set into motion an endless war in order to keep their own populations down as powerless serfs? At first so that they would enjoy the best things in life as the ruling class, but eventually just for the sake of power itself.

Now, my point about all this is that it came about due to the length of WW2. If on the other hand Britain had crashed out in 1940 and held elections, any work of this type written by Orwell would have been quite different, probably more like his slant on Invasion Literature. Perhaps a book in which Nazis and Soviets (or their fantasy analogues, like the pigs in Animal Farm) are locked in vicious endless ideological struggle, but emphasising that their differing ideologies are both just excuses to stay in power (Hitler and Stalin or characters representing them knocking back champagne over the dinner table as Stalingrad goes on etc.)
 
This is a very interesting approach there, Thande! I really appreciate your answer there.

Thing is, to me, I never have dealt much with the political situation inside Britain during WWII - if you will, the image that the British propaganda created struck, namely that "Britain was holding together". I am well aware of the fact though that in 1940, this was by no means the case and that morale in Britain hung by a thread.

So yes, if we follow that train of thought, it's conceivable that this image of Orwell would be far less intense in the ATL, and "1984" (or an equivalent work) would have an entirely different connotation.
 
Since Nazism and communism were both totalitarian dictatorial systems, it would not have mattered which side prevailed and the story might not have changed much.

It would have made a rather large difference. The idea of 1984 is the bastardizing of ideology by men greedy for power. The party destroys Socialism and all it stood for in the name of Socialism. It presents itself as the truest freedom to its followers while simultaneously creating the greatest form of repression man has ever known, all the while with the inner party knowing its only purpose is raw power for the sake of power. It is doublethink and the corruption of ideals while maintaining the name and face of those ideals, and the suffering of man under that which makes up a heavy part of the book's theme.
Nazism is far more black and white. It does not present itself as freedom and then turns on that ideology like Stalinist Russia or the nations of 1984. It presents itself as very much the anti-freedom; the idea that democracy and republic and the freedoms of both have led to weakness and corruption and weak, small men having the power to rule over the strong in a form against nature where only the strong should rule.
 
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