It had the lasting effect of turning Orwell’s shadowy villain into a celebrity. “The term Big Brother, which the day before yesterday meant nothing to 99 percent of the population,” The Times of London reported, “has become a household phrase.”

A Propaganda Tool

While Orwell was a man of the left, the novel was seized on as a useful cultural weapon against the Soviet Union. The Time-Life publisher Henry Luce promoted it in his magazines. And the Central Intelligence Agency, which had financed an animated film version of Orwell’s “Animal Farm,” also took an interest in “1984.”

The agency helped fund the 1956 British film version, starring Edmond O’Brien, Michael Redgrave and Jan Sterling, while the executive director of the American Committee for Cultural Freedom — an affiliate of the C.I.A.-backed Congress for Cultural Freedom — worked behind the scenes to alter Orwell’s bleak ending. The novel ends with Winston Smith’s total submission, but the British version of the film shows him being gunned down after shouting “Down with Big Brother!” The Orwell estate later withdrew the film from circulation.