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“1984, Tell me that it is not your Identity!?
Imagine a portrait of a man with nothing on it … no eyes to see (witness), no lips to speak (criticize) and no nose to smell (stink) …. Not knowing who he is….. The bothersome of the lack of identity ….they all will ruin me up inside, but still so intriguing that makes one take the book out of the shelf and pay some for it.
This article tends to study 1984 by George Orwell with emphasis on the summary, characters analysis, comparison to other works, critics of different people and my own interpretation in this essay.
Here the background of the author will help us to have a deeper understanding of the book. George Orwell is the pen name of Eric Arthur Blair, born in 1903 in Motihari, Bengal, India, during the time of the British colonial rule. Young Orwell was brought to England by his mother and educated in Henley and Sussex at schools. The family was not wealthy; however, the young Orwell had a gift for writing from the age of five or six. His first work published, the poem “Awake Young Men of England,” when he was eleven years.
Orwell studied the master writers and began to develop his own writing style. At Eton College, he came into contact with liberalist and socialist ideals, and it was here that the very beginning political views of him were formed. In 1922, he served as an Assistant Superintendent of Police for five years. In 1928, Orwell moved to Paris and began a series of low paying jobs. In 1929, he moved to London, again living in what he termed “fairly severe poverty.”
These experiences provided the material for his first novel, Down and Out in Paris and London, which he placed with a publisher in 1933. During this time, he worked part time in a bookshop, where he met his future wife, Eileen O’Shaughnessy. In Spain, Orwell found what he had been searching for—a true socialist state. He joined the struggle against the Fascist party but had to flee when the group with which he was associated was falsely accused of secretly helping the Fascists.
In 1941, he took a position with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) that he disliked it very much, but later in 1943, Orwell took a job more to his liking, as the literary editor of The Tribune. Tragically, Eileen died in the beginning of 1944, and just before the publication of one of his most important novels, Animal Farm.
Despite the loss of his wife and his own battle with poor health, Orwell continued his writing and completed the revision of 1984 in 1948. It was published early the next year with great success. He is buried in the churchyard of All Saints, Sutton Courtenay, and Berkshire.
Here the summary of the book will help you through the critics and the rest.
W
inston Smith is a member of the Outer Party. He works in the Records Department in the Ministry of Truth, rewriting and distorting, falsifying the history. To escape Big Brother’s cruelty, at least inside his own mind, Winston begins a diary—an act severely against the rules. Winston is determined to remain human under inhuman circumstances. Yet telescreens are placed everywhere—in his home, at his work, in the cafeteria where he eats, even in the bathroom. Every move of his is watched. No place is safe.
One day, while at the Two Minutes Hate, Winston catches the eye of an Inner Party Member, O’Brien, whom he believes to be an ally. He also catches the eye of a dark-haired girl from the Fiction Department, whom he believes is his enemy and wants him destroyed. A few days later, Julia, the dark-haired girl whom Winston believes to be against him, secretly hands him a note that reads, “I love you.” Winston takes pains to meet her, and when they finally do, Julia draws up a complicated plan where they can be alone.
Alone in the countryside, Winston and Julia make love and begin their disloyalty against the Party and Big Brother. Winston is able to secure a room above a shop where he and Julia can go for their romantic relation. Winston and Julia fall in love, and, while they know that they will someday be caught, they believe that the love and loyalty they feel for each other can never be taken from them, even under the worst circumstances.
Eventually, Winston and Julia confess to O’Brien, whom they believe to be a member of the Brotherhood (an underground organization aimed at bringing down the Party), their hatred of the Party. O’Brien welcomes them into the Brotherhood with an array of questions and arranges for Winston to be given a copy of “the book,” written by their leader, Emmanuel Goldstein, former ally of Big Brother turned enemy.
Winston gets the book at a war rally and takes it to the secure room where he reads it with Julia napping by his side. The two are disturbed by a noise behind a painting in the room and discover a telescreen. They are dragged away and separated. Winston finds himself deep inside the Ministry of Love, a kind of prison with no windows, where he sits for days alone.
Finally, O’Brien comes. Initially Winston believes that O’Brien has also been caught, but he soon realizes that O’Brien is there to torture him and break his spirit. The Party had been aware of Winston’s “crimes” all along; in fact, O’Brien has been watching Winston, he was a spy!
O’Brien spends the next few months torturing Winston in order to change his way of thinking. Winston believes that the human mind must be free, and to remain free, one must be allowed to believe in an objective truth, such as 2 + 2 = 4. O’Brien wants Winston to believe that 2 + 2 = 5, but Winston is resistant.
Finally, O’Brien takes Winston to Room 101, the most frightening room of all in the Ministry of Love, the place where prisoners meet their greatest fear. Winston’s greatest fear is rats. O’Brien places over Winston’s head a mask made of wire and threatens to open the door to release rats on Winston’s face. When Winston screams, “Do it to Julia!” he gives up his last bit of humanity.
Winston is changed. He sits in the Chestnut Tree Café, watching the telescreens. He has seen Julia again. She, too, is changed, seeming older and less attractive. She admits that she also betrayed him. In the end, there is no doubt, Winston loves Big Brother.
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The mature reader will also look for a character criticism in order to gain a better connection with them .
w
inston Smith, the reader experience that world through the major character’s point of view . Winston is taken from Winston Churchill, the exalted leader of wartime England, and Smith is the most common last name in the English language, this allow readers to see him as Orwell wanted : an ordinary man in struggle with extraordinary circumstances .
He represents the feelings in every human being, and that is why readers hope that things will change. Orwell characterizes Winston as a complete and sympathetic human being.
Because Winston is so real and common, readers can easily sympathize with him, and for it they can imagine themselves in a society like that.
Readers identify so closely with Winston because he has individuality and self-determination. He is a representative for; democracy, peace, freedom, love. When Winston is destroyed, these things are destroyed with him as well.
At the end, Winston loses his spirit and his humanity, the two characteristics that he fought so hard to keep. Orwell insists that Winston’s destiny could happen to anyone, and it is for this reason that Orwell destroys Winston in the end, so that the reader may understand Orwell’s warning.
j
ulia is Winston’s love and his ally in the struggle against Big Brother. She represents the elements of humanity that Winston does not: pure sexuality, cunning, and survival.
While Winston enjoys sex and intimacy, Julia is an outwardly sexual being and sleeps with Party members regularly—at least before she meets Winston. She does not do this to destroy the Party but to her own desires, and that is the basic difference between Winston and Julia. His rebellion is as much for future generations as it is for himself; her rebellion is purely to her own desires.
Julia uses sex to attack the Party, but it is far less effective a weapon than love. When Julia and Winston fall in love, they commit the final offense against the Party. Pay attention that the couple was caught at their happiest moment, the moment where they let down their guard and were like an ordinary couple. Both had been watched for years and could have been captured at any time.
Julia gives Winston hope and it is the continuation of this hope that gets them both destroyed.
N
ewspeak , by using this language , Orwell provides the condition of awakening people and broaden their thoughts . The Newspeak unlike other languages loses words, by removing words that represent opposing concepts. The idea of this language is that, when the language becomes less expressive, the mind is more easily can be controlled. Through his creation and explanation of Newspeak, Orwell warns the reader that a government that creates the language can control the minds of its citizens.
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omparison to other works ; Of course Orwell is not the only one who pictures the world in this way .There are some similar works that are important and interesting to read. Zamyatin’s US , Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World described the present situation of the world as Orwell did and warn us about the future .These triple dystopia of the middle of 20th century are exactly in the opposite point to the triple utopia that were written in 16th and 17th century .
This dystopia is different in details, though the book US is much similar to 1984 in comparison to the book the Brave New World. US and 1984 both depict a society that is tough and rule-based, present a human being with a number and that he has lost identity, individuality and his own privacy.
The most significant question to pose about these dystopia is that ; is it possible for the nature of human being to change , in order to forget his wills, desires, love, perfection, faithfulness?!
Will a day come that he forgets his being a human?
In these works authors do not accepts human being like a white paper with nothing on it …and let the society engrave whatever it likes. They do believe that men longs for Love, Justice, Truth and Corporation .The three of them show in their books the use of different methods for destroying these feelings... And expressing that it is too hard, even impossible, to do that …Zamyatin by doing some brain surgery, Orwell by brain washing and Huxley by some tablets and stuff like that... all in their different ways.
But all come to the same conclusion: this is POSSIBLE by the means of current methods and tools of the new time.
My own interpretation and understanding as an immature reader may let you know more about 1984. Newspeak, Big Brother, brainwash, Thought police, all of them are the features that may not let you to be the person you want to be .telescreens will watch your movements, Thought police will not let you live the way you want, the newspeak will narrow your thoughts and imagination, what you see is perfection and you are in no need for search of something better. The sense of trust has been ruined and you can not trust even your own self. Winston who tries for the freedom of mind and body, at the end forgets everything, forgets the objective truth and accept the party, the Big Brother.
I will recommend this book to anybody interested about now and future. By reading these information, summary, characters analysis, comparison to other works, critics of different people and my own interpretation, you are going to be more aware of your existence. You will be alarmed about the future that may happen to Men. Try not to lose your faith, your love, your compassion and try not to forget about the truth …
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