To the future or to the past, to a time when thought is free, when men are different from one another and do not live alone – to a time when truth exists and what is done cannot be undone: From the age of uniformity, from the age of solitude, from the age of Big Brother, from the age of doublethink – greetings!
– George Orwell
1984. Part 1, Chapter 2. Winston writing. This suggests that the world Winston Smith lives in in one controlled by a corrupt state, where thought is not free.