The book 1984 was published in 1949.

The story behind the answer

Correct—George Orwell’s dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four was first published in 1949 (Secker & Warburg in the U.K.; Harcourt, Brace in the U.S.). Arriving just after World War II, it captured rising Cold War fears of totalitarian control, propaganda, and relentless surveillance.

To remember the date, note that Orwell finished the book in 1948; many believe he flipped those digits to title it “1984.” The novel introduced enduring concepts—Big Brother, Thought Police, Newspeak, and doublethink—that warn how language and technology can shrink freedom. Placing it in 1949 situates it amid postwar anxieties about Stalinism and authoritarianism that shaped mid-20th-century politics and culture.