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The book, first published in 1949, features a devious "Big
Brother" government that spies on its citizens and forces them
into "doublethink," or simultaneously accepting contradictory
versions of the truth.
Sales spiked after a senior White House official, Kellyanne
Conway, used the term "alternative facts" on NBC's "Meet the
Press" on Sunday during a discussion about the size of the crowd
at Trump's inauguration.
Some commentators denounced her expression as "Orwellian."
By Monday, the novel by the late British author hit Amazon's
list of top 10 bestsellers, which is updated hourly. On
Wednesday, it was No.1.
Responding to the renewed interest, its publisher ordered a
75,000-copy reprint this week, Signet Classics said in a
statement. A company spokesman told CNN late on Tuesday that was
more than would normally be reprinted.
The West Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union,
which has vowed to "resist" the president's policies on
immigration and other issues, said on Twitter it picked "1984"
as the read of the month for its book club.
Conway was responding to accusations that the Trump
administration was fixated on the size of his inauguration
crowds, saying: "We feel compelled to go out and clear the air
and put alternative facts out there."
Amid widespread criticism of the expression, even
Merriam-Webster chimed in to challenge Trump's former campaign
manager. "A fact is a piece of information presented as having
objective reality," the dictionary publisher tweeted.
(Reporting by Laila Kearney; Editing by Daniel Wallis and Lisa
Shumaker)
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