George Orwell
‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’

Advance Review Copy

By Daniel J. Leab:

The American edition was set separately from a copy of Orwell's manuscript. Orwell in the proof stage caught some of the changes made by Harcourt's editors, but there are differences between the original American and British editions. Another problem arose from Harcourt's wooing of the Book-of-the-Month Club. Initially the club agreed to accept the Orwell book only on deletion of some of the more political and theoretical parts of the novel, such as the Appendix on “The Principles of Newspeak” — the substitute for “Old Speak (or Standard English, as we should call it)” whose implementation Orwell explained was “designed to diminish the range of thought”. Orwell refused to delete anything and after some brief hesitation the Club agreed to accept the Orwell book as a monthly selection.