“It is a commonplace that the history of civilization is largely the history of weapons.”

Published a mere two-and-a-half months after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, You and the Atomic Bomb explores the repercussions of the emerging atomic age. In this 1945 essay, Orwell argues that the atomic bomb will intensify and accelerate the world’s shift toward totalitarianism and consolidated power, and suggests that its existence will likely lead to a stalemate, a permanent, tense state of cold war(incidentally, one of the earliest uses of that phrase) in which the nuclear-armed superstates dominate the world and smaller nations will be powerless against them.

You and the Atomic Bomb remains strikingly relevant—perhaps more now than when it was first published—given the way today’s geopolitical landscape reflects so many of Orwell’s predictions.

Born Eric Arthur Blair, George Orwell (1903-1950) was a British novelist, essayist, and critic famous for his insightful social and political commentary. His personal engagement with real world issues imbues his work with a sense of social conscience that continues to resonate with readers, and his two most famous novels, Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four, continue to captivate audiences worldwide.