T he rules of Oceania in George Orwell’s “1984” were clear: “Not even the smallest deviation of opinion on the most unimportant subject can be tolerated.” Any book that carried the wrong line “had to be rectified at lightning speed”. Only things that would not disturb the minds of the populace were allowed, since the “best books” are “those that tell you what you know already”. It is an idea that some readers took to heart: in 2022 a British university added a “trigger warning” to “1984”, alerting readers to the presence of racism, sexism and “political ideas”.

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