Archive
11/02/09
1949's 1984, in 2009
Were George Orwell alive and kicking, today, He'd be the first on his cell block at St. Elizabeths, Two units downwind from Ezra Pound's, To proclaim Nineteen Eighty-Four arrived, Come in the flesh, to flagellate man, for his sins.
Though committed, for having written his sinister novel, He'd be surrounded by technology's newest fetishes, Have access to MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Yuku, Be in constant contact with "friends" on the outside, Through his iPhone, BlackBerry, PC.
Certainly, the predictably prescient Eric Blair Would see his Big Brother prototype Subsumed by the Bigger Brother of surveillance, Google, That omniscient guru ubiquitously with us, Feel a liberating vindication for his "science fiction."
And as the vicissitudes of history might have it, He'd be lionized as a giant, a sage for the ages, His padded chamber swamped, daily, by pilgrims Come to praise him for his telescreen prophecies, Which have brought us so close to each other
That we can know, in the touch of a fingertip, What everyone is doing, thinking, any instantaneous now, Every and any one the Web has trapped in its gossamer. And what might he tell us — "There's no going back"? "Friends Of Friends Are Friends"? "You Are Us, We Are You"?
11/02/09
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