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Nineteen Eighty-Four
Nineteen Eighty-Four was first
published by Martin Secker & Warburg, London, in 1949.The first
paperback edition was published by Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, in 1954.
Since then it has been reprinted in the Penguin edition twenty-six times.
INDEX
Summary (below)
Characters - Winston Smith | Julia | O'Brien | Big Brother
Plot
Political System - Party | Proles | Newspeak | Doublethink
Symbolism
Summary
The Story starts, as the title tells us,
in the year of 1984, and it takes place in England or how it is called at
that time, Airstrip One. Airstrip One itself is the mainland of a huge
country, called Oceania, which consists of North America, South Africa,
and Australia. The country is ruled by the Party, which is led by a figure
called Big Brother. The population of Oceania is divided into three parts:
1.The Inner Party (app. 1% of the population) 2.The Outer Party
(app. 18% of the population) 3.The Proles The narrator of the book
is 'Third Person Limited'. The protagonist is Winston Smith, a member of
the OuterParty, working in the Records Department of the Ministry of
Truth, rewriting and altering records, such as newspaper-articles, of the
past. The action starts when Winston develops critic thoughts against the
ruling dictatorship of the party, for the first time. Doing so he buys
himself a book, a rare thing these days, to use it as a diary. As
individual expression was forbidden by the Party, having a diary was a
crime, which could even be punished with death. There were so-called
telescreens in each room, showing propaganda and political pamphlets,
which had a built in camera and microphone, in order to spy on the people.
Therefore keeping a secret book was not only forbidden, but also very
dangerous. When Winston makes the first entry in the diary ,he thinks
about an experience he has made during the Two Minutes Hate, a propaganda
film, that was repeated each day. During this Film he caught the eye of
O'Brien, a member of the Inner Party, of whom he thought that he might
alos stand critic to the regime, or that at least there is a bond of some
kind between them. After the reflection, he finds that he has written the
sentence :"Down with Big Brother" all over the page. In the same night
Winston dreams about, his mother and sister, who had starved to death in
the war, because he had been so greedy. Then he dreams of having sex with
a girl he has seen in the Records Department, during the Two Minute Hate.
Early in the morning Winston is waken up by the harsh voice from the
telescreen. During the performance of the exercises, Winston's thoughts
move back to his childhood. The last thing he remembers clearly, is the
World War. After the WW the party has taken control of the country, and
from then on it was difficult to remember anything, because the party
changed the history permanently to their own benefit (see Doublethink -
Political System).After the exercises Winston goes to work, to the
Minitrue (Ministry of Truth), where his job is to alter records, and once
altered, to throw them into the Memory Hole where they are burnt. For
example B.B. (Big Brother) has promised that there will be no reduction of
the chocolate ration, but there has been one, so Winston has to rewrite an
old article, where the speech of B.B. is written down. At dinner Winston
Smith meets Syme, a philologist, who is working on the 11
th edition of The Newspeak Dictionary (see Newspeak -
Political System), Syme explains the main character of their work on this
dictionary. During their conversation the telescreen announces that the
chocolate ration has been risen to 20 g a week, whereas yesterday it was
cut down to 20 g a week.Winston wonders whether he's the only person with
memory, that isn't inflicted by Doublethink. As he looks around in the
dining room he catches the eye of the dark-haired girl he had dreamed the
same night. Back home again he makes an entry into his diary about his
meeting with a prostitute three years ago. He rememberes her ugliness, but
nevertheless he had sex with her. Winston had a wife, but she was very
stupid and just following the orders of the Party, which said that there
may only be Sex to produce "new material" for the Party, and that sex for
the personal pleasure is a crime. Then Winston thinks about the Party, and
believes that the only hope lies in the Proles who pose over 80% of
Oceanias population. Later he remembers another fact of his past, Jones,
Aaronson and Rutherford, the last three survivors of the original leaders
of the Revolution. They were arrested in 1965, and confessed all kind of
sabotage on trial, they were pardoned, reinstated but not long after were
arrested again, and executed. During the brief period Winston has seen
them in the Chestnut Tree Cafe. In the same year a half page torn out of
The Times came to Winston trough the transport tube in the Minitrue. This
page of The Times showed the three men in Eastasia on a certain day. But
Winston remembered clearly that they have confessed being in Eurasia on
that day (At this time Eurasia was at war with Oceania, and Eastasia was
an allied). So Winston could proof that the confessions were lies. But
Winston had sent this paper down to the Memory Hole (a kind of paper
basket) The last entry Winston writes in his diary is that freedom is to
say that two and two makes four. If this is granted everything else
follows. The next day Winston decides not to participate in the community
actions, but to take a walk in the quarters of the Proles, around St
Pancras station. During the walk a Rocket-Bomb explodes nearby. After a
while Winston finds himself in front of the junk-shop, where he has bought
the diary. There he sees an old man just entering a pub. He decides to
follow the man, and to ask him about the time before the revolution, but
the old man has already forgotten nearly everything about this time,
except for some useless personal things. Winston leaves the pub and goes
to the Shop, where he finds a pink piece of glass with apiece of coral
inside which he buys. Mr Carrington, the owner of the shop leads him
upstairs to show him an old fashioned room. W. Smith likes the room
because of its warmth and of course because there are no telescreens. When
Winston leaves the shop he suddenly meets the dark-haired girl in the
street. He now believes that this girl is an amateur spy or even a member
of the Thought Police, spying on him. The next morning he meets the girl
in the Ministry of Truth, and in the moment she passes, she falls down and
cries out in pain. When Winston helps her up, she has presses a piece of
paper into his hand. At the first opportunity he opens it and finds the
startling message: "I love you" written on it. For a week he waits for an
opportunity to speak with her. Finally he is successful, and he meets her
in the canteen where they fix a meeting. Some time later they meet on the
fixed place, there the girl gives Winston precise instructions how to get
to a secret place on Sunday. It is Sunday and Winston is following the
girl's directions. On the way he picks some bluebells for her. And then
finally she comes up behind him, telling him to be quiet because there
might be some microphones hidden somewhere. They kiss and he learns her
name: Julia. She leads him to another place where they cannot be observed.
Before she takes off her blue party-overall, Julia tells Winston that she
is attracted to him by something in his face which showes that he is
against the party. Winston is surprised and asks Julia if she has done
such a thing before. To his delight she tells him that she has done it
scores of times, which fills him with a great hope. Evidence of corruption
and abandon always gives him with hope. Perhaps the whole system is
rotten, and will simply crumb to pieces one day. The more men she had, the
more he loves her, and later as he looks at her sleeping body, he thinks
that now even sex is a political act, a blow against the falseness of the
Party. Winston and Julia arrange to meet again. Winston rents the room
above Mr Carringtons junk shop, a place where they can meet and talk
without the fear of being observed. It is summer and the preparations for
"Hate Week", an enormous propaganda event, are well forthcoming, and in
this time Winston meets Julia more often than ever before. Julia makes him
feel more alive, she makes him feel healthier, and he even puts on weight.
One day O'Brien speaks to Winston in the Ministry of Truth. He refers,
obliquely to Syme, the philologist, who has vanished a couple of days
before, and is now, as it is called in Newspeak an unperson. In doing so
O'Brien is committing a little act of thoughtcrime. O'Brien invites
Winston to his flat, to see the latest edition of the Newspeak dictionary.
Winston now feels sure that the conspiracy against the Party he had longed
to know about - the Brotherhood, as it is called - does exist, and that in
the encounter with O'Brien he has come into contact with its outer edge.
He knows that he has embarked on a course of action which will lead , in
one way or another, to the cells of the Ministry of Love. Some days later
Winston and Julia meet each other to go to the flat of O'Brien, which lies
in the district of the Inner Party. They are admitted to a richly
furnitured room by a servant. To their astonishment O'Brien switches off
the Telescreen in the room.(Normally it is impossible to turn it off)
Winston blurts out why they have come: they want to work against the
Party, they believe in the existence of the Brotherhood, and that O'Brien
is involved with it. Martin, O'Brien's servant brings real red wine, and
they drink a toast to Emanuel Goldstein, the leader of the Brotherhood.
O'Brien asks them a series of questions about their willingness to commit
various atrocities on behalf of the Brotherhood and gets their assent.
They leave, and some days later Winston gets a copy of "The Book", a book
written by Emanuel Goldstein, about his political ideas. Now it is Hate
Week and suddenly the war with Eurasia stopps, and a war with Eastasia
starts. This of course meant a lot of work for Winston. He had to change
dozens of articles about the war with Eurasia. Nevertheless Winston finds
time to read the book. The book has three chapters titled, "War is Peace",
"Ignorance is Strength" and "Freedom is Slavery", which were also the main
phrases of the party. The main ideas of the book are: 1: War is
important for consuming the products of human labour, if this work would
be used to increase the standard of living, the control of the party over
the people would decrease. War is the economy basis for a hierarchical
society. 2: There is an emotional need to believe in the ultimate
victory of Big Brother. 3: In becoming continuous war has ceased to
exist. The continuity of the war guarantees the permanence of the current
order. In other words "War is Peace" 4: There have always been three
main grades of society; the High, the Middle and the Low, and no change
has brought human equality a millimetre nearer. 5: Collectivism doesn't
lead to socialism. In the event the wealth now belongs to the new
"high-class", the bureaucrats and administrators. Collectivism has ensured
the permanence of economic inequality. 6: Wealth is not inherited from
person to person, but it is kept within the ruling group. 7: The masses
(proles) are given freedom of thought, because they don't think! A Party
member is not allowed the slightest deviation of thought, and there is an
elaborate mental training to ensure this, a training that can be
summarised in the concept of doublethink. So far the book analyses how
the Party works. It has not yet attempted to deal with why the Party has
arisen. Before continuing with the next chapter Winston turns to Julia,
and finds her asleep. He also falls asleep. The next morning when he
awakes the sun is shining, and down in the yard a prole women is singing
and working. Winston is again filled with the conviction that the future
lies with the proles, that they will overthrow the greyness of the Party.
But suddenly reality crashes in. "We are the DEAD", he says to Julia. An
iron voice behind them repeats the phrase, the picture on the wall falls
to bits to reveal a telescreen behind it. Uniformed man thunder into the
room and they carry Winston and Julia out.Winston is in a cell in what he
presumes is the Ministry of Love. He is sick with hunger and fear, and
when he makes a movement or a sound, a harsh voice will bawl at him from
the four telescreens. A prisoner who is dying of starvation is brought in,
his face is skull-like. Later the man is brought to "Room 101" after
screaming and struggling, and even offering his children's sacrifices in
his stead. O'Brien enters. Winston thinks that they must have got him too,
but O'Brien says that they got him long time ago. A guard hits Winston,
and he becomes unconscious. When he wakes up he is tied down to a kind of
bed. O'Brien stands beside the bed, and Winston feels that O'Brien, who is
the torturer, is also somehow a friend. The aim of O'Brien is to teach
Winston the technique of Doublethink, and he does it by inflicting pain in
ever-increasing intensity. He reminds Winston that he wrote the sentence:"
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two makes four". O'Brien holds
up four fingers of his left hand, and he asks Winston how many there are.
Winston answers four a couple of times, and each time the pain increases
(this is not done to make Winston lie, but to make him really see five
fingers instead of four). At the end of the session, under heavy influence
of drugs and agony, Winston really seas five fingers. Now Winston is ready
to enter the second stage of his integration (1. Learning, 2.
Understanding, 3. Acceptance). O'Brien now explains why the Party works.
The image he gives of the future is that of a boot stamping on a human
face - for ever. Winston protests, because he thinks that there is
something in the human nature that will not allow this, he calls it "The
Spirit of Man". O'Brien points out that Winston is the last humanist, he
is the last guardian of the human spirit. Then O'Brien gets Winston to
look at himself in the mirror, Winston is horrified what he sees. The
unknown time of torture has changed him into a shapeless and battered
wreck. This is what the last humanist looks like. The only degradation
that Winston has not been trough, is that he has not betrayed Julia. He
has said anything under torture, but inside he has remained true to her.
Winston is much better now. For some time he has not been beaten and
tortured, he has been fed quite well and allowed to wash. Winston realises
that he now accepts all the lies of the Party, that for example Oceania
was always at war with Eastasia, and that he never had the photograph of
Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford that disproved their guilty. Even gravity
could be nonsense. But nevertheless Winston has some unorthodox thoughts
that he cannot suppress. But now it is time for the last of the three
steps, reintegration. Winston is taken to Room 101. O'Brien says that the
room 101 is the worst thing in the world. For each person it is his own
personal hell. For some it is death by fire or burial alive. For Winston
it is a cage containing two rats, with a fixture like a fencing mask
attached, into which the face of the victim is strapped. Then there is a
lever, that opens the cage ,so that the rats can get to the face. O'Brien
is approaching nearer with the cage ,and Winston gets the bad smell of the
rats. He screams. The only way to get out of this is to put someone else
between him and the horror."Do it to Julia", he screams in a final
betrayal of himself. Winston is released, and he is often sitting in the
Chestnut Tree Café, drinking Victory Gin and playing chess. He now has a
job in a sub-committee , that is made up for others like himself. On a
cold winter day he meets Julia, they speak briefly, but have little to say
to each other, except that they have betrayed each other. A memory of a
day in his childhood comes to Winstons' mind; It is false, he is often
troubled by false memories. He looks forward to the bullet, they will kill
him some day. Now he realises how pointless it was to resist. He loves
Big Brother!
Characters
Winston Smith Orwell named his hero after Winston
Churchill, England's great leader during World War II. He added a common
last name: Smith. The action of this novel is built around the main
person, Winston Smith, and therefore the understanding of his personality,
and his character is important for the understanding of the whole book.
Winston was born before the Second World War. During the War, there was a
lack of food, and Winston has taken nearly all of the food that was
allocated to the family, although his younger sister was starving to
death. In 1984 Winston often dreams of this time, and he often remembers
how he once has stolen the whole chocolate, that was given to the family.
I think that Winston now (1984) somehow regrets his egotistic behaviour.
He also sees a kind of link between his behaviour, and the behaviour of
the children that are educated by the Party. These children prosecute
their own family (Parsons). He finally realises his and the Party's guilt.
To my mind Winston is a sort of hero, because he is aware of the danger
that he has encountered. So for example he knew it from the very beginning
that his diary would be found. And as one can see the things that are
written in this book (that freedom is to say that two and two makes four)
are used against him later . He also knew that his illegal love affair was
an act of revolution, would be disclosed by the Thought Police. But
nevertheless he is some kind of naive. He has opened his mind to O'Brien
before he was sure that he was also against the Party.
Julia Julia is a women around 25, and she works in
a special department of the Minitrue, producing cheap Pornography for the
proles. She had already a couple of illegal love affairs. Unlike Winston,
she is basically a simple woman, something of a lightweight who loves her
man and uses sex for fun as well as for rebellion. She is perfectly
willing to accept the overnight changes in Oceania's history and doesn't
trouble her pretty head about it. If Big Brother says black is white,
fine. If he says two and two make five, no problem. She may not buy the
Party line, but it doesn't trouble her. She falls asleep over Winston's
reading of the treasured book by Goldstein. Orwell draws Winston's love
object lovingly. Julia is all woman, sharp and funny as she is attractive,
but she may also be a reflection of the author's somewhat limited view of
the opposite sex.
O'Brien Probably the most interesting thing about
O'Brien is that we have only Winston's opinion of him. This burly but
sophisticated leader of the Inner Party is supposed to be the head of the
secret Brotherhood dedicated to the overthrow of Big Brother. In his black
overall, he haunts both Winston's dreams and his waking moments to the
very end of the novel. Another very interesting thing about O'Brien is
that the reader doesn't precisely know if he is a friend or an enemy of
Winston. Yet even Winston himself doesn't know it . I would say that
O'Brien, the powerful and mighty Party member, is a kind of father for
Winston. Before Winston's capture, O'Brien "helps" Winston to make contact
with the Brotherhood, and he teaches him about the Ideology and the rules
of this secret Organisation. After the capture O'Brien gives Winston the
feeling, that he is somehow protecting him. The relation between O'Brien
and Winston has all attributes of a typical relation between a father and
a child: The father is all-knowing, all-mighty; he teaches, punishes and
educates his child, and he is protecting it, from anything that could harm
the child. But I think that O'Brien is only playing his role, due to
reintegrate Winston.
Big Brother Big Brother is not a real person.
All-present as he is, all-powerful and forever watching, he is only seen
on TV. Although his picture glares out from huge posters that shout, BIG
BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU, nobody sees Big Brother in person. Orwell had
several things in mind when he created Big Brother. He was certainly
thinking of Russian leader Joseph Stalin; the pictures of Big Brother even
look like him. He was also thinking of Nazi leader Adolph Hitler and
Spanish dictator Francisco Franco. Big Brother stands for all dictators
everywhere. Orwell may have been thinking about figures in certain
religious faiths when he drew Big Brother. The mysterious, powerful,
God-like figure who sees and knows everything- but never appears in
person. For Inner Party members, Big Brother is a leader, a bogeyman they
can use to scare the people, and their authorisation for doing whatever
they want. If anybody asks, they can say they are under orders from Big
Brother. For the unthinking proles, Big Brother is a distant authority
figure. For Winston, Big Brother is an inspiration. Big Brother excites
and energises Winston, who hates him. He is also fascinated by Big Brother
and drawn to him in some of the same ways that he is drawn to O'Brien,
developing a love-hate response to both of them that leads to his
downfall.
Plot The plot has three main
movements, corresponding to the division of the book in three parts. The
first part, the first eight chapters, creates the world of 1984, a
totalitarian world where the Party tries to control everything, even
thought and emotion. In this part Winston develops his first unorthodox
thoughts. The second part of the novel deals with the development of his
love to Julia, someone with whom he can share his private emotions. For a
short time they create a small world of feeling for themselves. They are
betrayed however. O'Brien, whom Winston thought being a rebel like
himself, is in reality a chief inquisitor of the Inner Party. The third
part of the novel deals with Winstons punishment. Finally he comes to love
Big Brother. Generally the plot is very simple: a rebel, a love affair
with a like-minded, capture, torture, and finally the capitulation. Apart
from Julia, O'Brien, and of course Winston, there are no important
characters; there is no attempt to create a range of social behaviour, and
the complex personal interactions therein, all traditional concerns of the
novel. Indeed one of Orwell's points is that life in 1984 has become
totally uniform. So the traditional novel would be unthinkable. In fact
Winston is the only character worth writing about; all the other
characters are half-robots already. So one could say that the plot was
built around Winstons mind and life. This gave Orwell the opportunity to
focus on the reaction of the individual to totalitarianism, love, and
cruelty.
Political System
Party The Party of Oceania poses about 19% of the
whole population of Oceanias mainland. Generally one could divide the
Party into the Inner Party, which is comparable to the communistic
Nomenclature, and the Outer Party. Winston Smith himself is a member of
the Outer Party. The members of the Inner Party hold high posts in the
administration of the country. They earn comparable much money, and there
isn't a lack of anything in their homes, which looked like palaces. The
people of the Outer Party live in dull grey and old flats. Because of the
war there is often a lack of the most essential things. The life of the
Outer Party is dictated by the Party, even their spare time is used by the
Party. There are so-called community hikes, community games and all sort
of other activities. And refusing the participation at this activities is
even dangerous. The life of a Party member is dictated from his birth to
his death. The Party even takes children away from their parents to
educate them in the sense of Ingsoc. (you can find this also in the
Communist future plans)The children are taught in school, to report it to
the police (Thoughtpolice) when their parents have unorthodox thoughts,
so-called "Thoughtcrimes". After the education the Party members start to
work mainly for one of the four Ministries (Minipax, Minitrue, Miniluv,
Miniplenty). The further life of the "comrades" continues under the
watchful eyes of the Party. Everything the people do is targeted by the
telescreens. Even in their homes people have telescreens. Each unorthodox
action is then punished by "joycamps" (Newspeak word for forced labour
camps").
Proles The proles make about 81% of the population
of Oceania. The Party itself is only interested in their labour power,
because the proles are mainly employed in the industry and in the farms.
Without their Labour force Oceania would break down. Despite this fact the
Party completely ignores this social caste. The curious thing about this
behaviour is, that the Party calls itself a Socialistic Party, and
generally socialism (at least at the beginning and middle of this century)
is a movement of the proletariat. So one could say that the Party abuses
the word "Ingsoc". Orwell again had pointed at an other regime, the Nazis,
who had put "socialism" into their name. One of the main phrases of the
Party is "Proles and animals are free". In Oceania the proles live in very
desolate and poor quarters. Compared to the districts where the members of
the Party live, there are much fewer telescreens, and policemen. And as
long as the proles don't commit a crime (crime in our sense / not in the
sense of the party - Thoughtcrime) they don't have any contact with the
state. Therefore in the districts of the proletarians one can find things
that are abolished and forbidden for the Party members. E.g. old books,
old furniture, prostitution and alcohol (mainly beer) Except "Victory Gin"
all of these things are not available for the Party-members. The
proletarians don't participate in the technical development. They live
like they used to do many years ago. To my mind the Party ignores the
Proles, because they pose no danger to their rule. The working class is
too uneducated and too unorganised to pose a real threat. So there is not
really a need to change the political attitudes of this class.
Newspeak Newspeak is the official language of
Oceania, and had been devised to meet ideological needs of Ingsoc, or
English Socialism. In the year 1984, there is nobody, who really uses
Newspeak in speech nor in writing. Only the leading articles are written
in this "language". But it is generally assumed that in the year 2050
Newspeak would superset Oldspeak, or common English. The purpose of
Newspeak is not only to provide medium of expression for the world-view
and mental habits proper to devotees of Ingsoc, but to make all other
methods of thought impossible. Another reason for developing Newspeak is,
to make old books, or books which were written before the era of the
Party, unreadable. With Newspeak ,Doublethink would be even easier. Its
vocabulary is so constructed as to give exact and often very subtle
expression to every meaning that a Party member could properly wish to
express, while excluding all other meanings and also the possibility of
arriving at them by indirect methods. This is done partly by the invention
of new words, but chiefly by eliminating undesirable words by stripping
such words as remained of unorthodox meanings whatever. Generally Newspeak
words are divided into three groups: the A,B(also called compound words)
and the C Vocabulary. A-Vocabulary: The A-Vocabulary consist of
the words needed in business and everyday life, for such things as
drinking, working, and the like. The words of this group are nearly
entirely composed of Oldspeak words, but in comparison, their number is
very small. Nevertheless the meaning of this words is much more defined,
and it allows no other interpretation. B-Vocabulary: The
B-Vocabulary consist of words which have been deliberately constructed for
political purpose. Without the full understanding of the principles of
Ingsoc it is very difficult to use and understand this words correctly.The
B-Vocabulary are in all cases compound words, and they consisted of two or
more words, merged together in an easy pronounceable form. Example:
goodthink - Goodthink means very roughly orthodoxy, or if it is
regarded as a verb "to think in a good manner". The infected as follows:
noun-verb goodthink; past tense and past participle, goodthinked; present
participle, goodthinking; adjective, goodthinkful; adverb, goodthinkwise;
verbal noun, goodthinker. The B-Words are not constructed on any
etymological plan. The words of which they are made up can be placed in
any order mutilated in any way which makes them easy to pronounce (e.g.
thoughtcrime, crimethink thinkpol, thought police).
Many of the B-Words are euphemisms. Such words for instance as joycamp
(forced labour camp) or Minipax (Ministry of Peace in charge of the army
), mean almost exact opposite of what they appear to mean. Again some
words are ambivalent, having the connotation good when applied to the
party, and bad when applied to its enemies. Generally the name of any
organisation, building, and so on is cut down to a minimum number of
syllables and to a minimum of length, in an easy pronounceable way. This
isn't only in Newspeak, already other, especially totalitarian systems,
tended to used abbreviations for political purpose (Nazi, Comintern,
Gestapo, ....). But the difference is that only in Newspeak this
instrument is used with consciousness. The Party intended to cut down the
possibility of associations with other words. C-Vocabulary: The
C-Words are consisting of technical and scientific terms. From the
foregoing account it is very easy to see that in Newspeak the expression
of unorthodox opinions, above a very low level, is impossible. It is only
possible to say "Big Brother is ungood". But this statement can't be
sustained by reasoned arguments, because the necessary words are not
available. Ideas inimical to Ingsoc can only be entertained in a very
vague and wordless form, and can only be named in very broad terms. One
could in fact only use Newspeak for political unorthodoxy, by
illegitimately translating some of the words back into Oldspeak. For
example "All mans are equal" was a possible Newspeak sentence, but only in
the same sense in which "All man have the same weight" is a possible
Oldspeak sentence. It did not contain a grammatical error, but it
expressed a palpable untruth i.e. that all man have the same size, weight
..... The concept of political equality no longer existed. In 1984, when
Oldspeak is still the normal mean of communication, the danger
theoretically exists that in using Newspeak words one might remember their
original meanings. In practice it is not difficult for a person well
grounded in Doublethink to avoid doing this, but within a couple of
generation even the possibility of such a lapse would have vanished. A
person growing up with Newspeak as his sole language would no more know
that equal had once had the secondary meaning of "politically equal" (also
free,....). There would be many crimes and errors which would be beyond of
the power to commit, simply because there were nameless and therefore
unimaginable. It is to be foreseen that with the passage of time Newspeak
words would become fewer and fewer, their meanings more and more and more
rigid, and the chance to put them to improper uses always diminished. So
when Oldspeak had been once and for all superseded the last link with the
past would have been severed.
Doublethink Doublethink is a kind of manipulation
of the mind. Generally one could say that Doublethink makes people accept
contradictions, and it makes them also believe, that, the party is the
only institution that distinguishes between right and wrong. This
manipulation is mainly done by the Minitrue (Ministry of Truth), where
Winston Smith works. When a person that is well grounded in Doublethink
recognizes a contradiction or a lie of the Party, then the person thinks
that he is remembering a false fact. The use of the word Doublethink
involves doublethink. With the help of the Minitrue it is not only
possible to change written facts, but also facts that are remembered by
the people. So complete control of the country and it's citizens is
provided. The fact of faking the history had already been used by the
Nazis, who told the people that already German Knights believed in the
principles of National Socialism.
Symbolism In "Nineteen
Eighty-Four" Orwell draws a picture of a totalitarian future. Although
the action deals in the future, there are a couple of elements and
symbols, taken from the present and past. So for example Emanuel
Goldstein, the main enemy of Oceania, is, as one can see in the name, a
Jew. Orwell draws a link to other totalitarian systems of our century,
like the Nazis and the Communists, who had anti-Semitic ideas, and who
used Jews as so-called scapegoats, who were responsible for all bad and
evil things in the country. This fact also shows that totalitarian systems
want to arbitrate their perfection. Emanuel Goldstein somehow also stands
for Trotsky, a leader of the Revolution, who was later declared as an
enemy. Another symbol that can be found in Nineteen Eighty-Four is
the fact that Orwell divides the fictional superstates in the book
according to the division that can be found in the Cold War. So Oceania
stands for the United States of America , Eurasia for Russia and Eastasia
for China. The fact that the two socialistic countries Eastasia and
Eurasia ( in our case Russia and China ) are at war with each other,
corresponds to our history (Usuri river). Other, non-historical symbols
can be found. One of these symbols is the paperweight that Winston buys in
the old junk-shop. It stands for the fragile little world that Winston and
Julia have made for each other. They are the coral inside of it. As Orwell
wrote: "It is a little chunk of history, that they have forgotten to
alter". The "Golden Country" is another symbol. It stands for the old
European pastoral landscape. The place where Winston and Julia meet for
the first time to make love to each other, is exactly like the "Golden
Country" of Winstons dreams.
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