ORWELL, George: 1984

- a dystopian social science fiction novel

(classic literary example of political and dystopian fiction, on the list of 100 best English-language novels
from 1923 to 2005)
- author: English novelist George Orwell
- published on 8 June 1949 by Secker & Warburg
- Orwell's ninth and final book completed in his lifetime
- Orwell was inspired by Jack London’s 1903 book The People of the Abyss, (detailed the author's
experience in the slums of London)
- focuses on the consequences of totalitarianism, mass surveillance, and repressive regimentation of persons
and behaviours within society
- modelled the authoritarian government in the novel after Stalinist Russia
- novel examines political manipulation with facts and truth + to demonstrate the terrifying possibilities of
totalitarianism
- story takes place in an imagined future, year 1984
- world has fallen victim to perpetual war, omnipresent government surveillance, historical negationism, and
propaganda
- Great Britain = Airstrip One, province of a totalitarian superstate named Oceania
- ruled by the Party + the Thought Police
- persecute individuality and independent thinking
- Big Brother = leader of the Party, cult of personality despite the fact that he may not even exist
- protagonist, Winston Smith, is a diligent and skillful rank-and-file worker, Outer Party member
- secretly hates the Party and dreams of rebellion
- forbidden relationship with a colleague, Julia
- starts to remember what life was like before the Party came to power

Style
- depressing, mirroring the functional style and aesthetics of the Party
- individuality is discouraged
- beauty is considered politically suspect
- tone is dark, pessimistic, and gloomy
- warning of how miserable life will be under totalitarianism
- similar to deprivation from World War II, when real sugar, butter, and coffee were luxuries
- story is told in a third-person (referring to Winston as “he”)
- language is markedly oppressive and dull (everything is ugly and gray)
- full of metaphors and foreshadowing
- sometimes modifies his style to match Winston’s thoughts (writing changes from grammatically correct and
precise to uncapitalized, unpunctuated
- proles speak with Cockney accents
- not yet anyone speaks Newspeak as their primary language
- replace Standard English by the year 2050
- epilogue itself is written in standard English
- the Party has not entirely succeeded in eradicating independent thought

Foreshadowing
- Winston’s betrayal of Julia is ironically foreshadowed by his insistence the Party can’t make him stop
loving her
- Winston’s betrayal of the Party is foreshadowed by the anti-Party comments he writes in his diary
- Winston’s misreading of Julia as a spy foreshadows that he will misread O’Brien as a friend instead of
antagonist
- the rat in Winston and Julia’s rented room foreshadows that they are being watched.

Story
- book is divided into 3 parts
- Winston Smith: member of the ruling Party in London, nation of Oceania
- The Party watches everything through telescreens (Big Brother sees you)
- The Party controls everything in Oceania (people’s history and language)
- invention of language called Newspeak (attempts to prevent political rebellion by eliminating words)
- even thinking rebellious thoughts is illegal (= thoughtcrime, worst of all crimes)
- Winston feels frustrated by the rigid control of the Party (prohibition of free thought, sex, and any
expression of individuality)
- Winston illegally bought a diary (writes his criminal thoughts)
+ become fixated on a powerful Party member named O’Brien (W. believes he is a secret member of the
Brotherhood – organisation which wants to overthrow the Party)
- Winston works in the Ministry of Truth (alters historical records to fit the needs of the Party)
- Winston receives a note from a girl (he though she 's watching him and wants to betray him) that reads “I
love you.”
- W. and Julia start to meet each other
- rent a room above the secondhand store in the prole district where Winston bought the diary
- Winston is sure that they will be caught and punished sooner or later
x Julia is more optimistic
- they both really hate The Party
- message that O’Brien wants to see him
- Winston and Julia travel to O’Brien’s luxurious apartment (O´Brien is a member of the powerful Inner
Party)
- O´Brien confirms to Winston and Julia that, he hates the Party + is a member of the Brotherhood
- gives Winston a copy of Emmanuel Goldstein’s book (manifesto of the Brotherhood)
- W. and J. read the book in their secret palce
- soldiers barge in and seize them (Mr. Charrington, proprietor of the store, is a member of the Thought
Police)
- soldiers take them to the Ministry of Love
- Winston finds that O’Brien is a Party spy (pretended to be a member of the Brotherhood)
- O’Brien spends months torturing and brainwashing Winston
- dreaded Room 101, the final destination for anyone who opposes the Party
- here, O’Brien tells Winston that he will be forced to confront his worst fear (nightmares about rats)
- Winston begs O’Brien to do it to Julia, not to him
- giving up Julia is what O’Brien wanted from Winston all along (spirit is broken)
- Winston is released to the outside world
- meets Julia but no longer feels anything for her
- W. accepted the Party entirely and even loves Big Brother

Characters
Winston Smith: main protagonist, his resistance, enables the reader to observe and understand the harsh
oppression that the Party, Big Brother, and the Thought Police institute, desperate to understand how and
why the Party exercises such absolute power in Oceania
- his human traits: rebelliousness, intelligence and thoughtfulnes
- hates the Party passionately
- commits innumerable crimes throughout the novel (writing in his diary, having an illegal love affair with
Julia, getting himself secretly indoctrinated into the anti-Party Brotherhood)
- through torture Winston is transformed into a loyal member of the Party and Big Brother
- constant paranoia about the Party (believes that he will be caught no matter what he does, he convinces
himself that he must continue to rebel)
- his fatalistic attitude makes him unable to imagine his relationship with Julia lasting very long
Julia: Winston’s lover
- only other person who Winston can be sure hates the Party and wishes to rebel against it as he does
(nothing else in common)
- sensual, pragmatic, content to live in the moment and make the best of her life
- practical plans to avoid getting caught by the Party
O’Brien: powerful member of the Inner Party
- tricks Winston into believing that he is a member of the revolutionary group called the Brotherhood
- appears at Winston’s jail cell to abuse and brainwash him in the name of the Party
- O’Brien admits that he pretended to be connected to the Brotherhood merely to trap Winston
- very un-developped character (by the end of the book, the reader knows far less about him than they
previously had thought)
- O’Brien himself was once rebellious (tortured same as Winston)
Big Brother: supreme ruler of Oceania, the leader of the Party
- The Party uses the image of Big Brother to instill a sense of loyalty and fear in the populace
- his portrait is everywhere (Big Brother is watching you) on coins, telescreens, large posters all over the city
- powerful role in society
x no actual appearance in the novel
- idea of Big Brother is to keep the people living in a state of fear
- Big Brother either doesn’t exist, or perhaps never existed, as an actual person (The Party itself)
Mr. Charrington: widower and the owner of a second-hand shop in the prole district of London
- tells Winston about London’s history and share in Winston’s interest in the past
- provides several key resources that facilitate Winston’s various crimes against the Party (diary, glass
paperweight - symbol of Winston’s connection to a concrete past + rents Winston the room)
- a member of the Thought Police (manipulative agent of the Party)
Syme: an intelligent (according to W. he is too intelligent to stay alive), outgoing ma, works with Winston at
the Ministry of Truth, specializes in language (working on a new edition of the Newspeak dictionary)
Parsons: ordinary Party member, lives near Winston, works at the Ministry of Truth, wife and a group of
suspicious, ill-mannered children (members of the Junior Spies)
Emmanuel Goldstein: according to the Party, Goldstein is the legendary leader of the Brotherhood, probably
a former Party leader who fell out of favour with the regime, the Party describes him as the most dangerous
and treacherous man in Oceania, doesn´t ever appear in the book (maybe he is an illusion, a way to deceive
people)

Themes and symbols

Psychological Manipulation and control
- through: telescreens, terror and fear (reminders – posters,...), The Though Police, everyone could be a spy,
Newspeak, the Junior Spies (spy on their parents and report any instance of disloyalty to the Party)
- The Party forces its members to undergo mass morning exercises called the Physical Jerks, and then to
work long (keeping people in a general state of exhaustion)
- rebels are punished and “reeducated” through systematic and brutal torture
Control Of Information And History
- The Party controls every source of information
- rewrites the content of all newspapers and histories
- does not allow individuals to keep records of their past
- memories become unreliable
= people believe whatever the Party tells them
- by controlling the present, the Party is able to manipulate the past = controlling the actions of future
Technology
- telescreens and hidden microphones across the city
- monitoring people everywhere all the time
Language As Mind Control
- language is of central importance to human thought because it structures and limits the ideas that
individuals are capable of formulating and expressing
- there would be no words to express rebellion
- Newspeak will replace English
Loyalty
- only kind of loyalty possible is loyalty to the Party
- everyone could be a spy (child, wife, friend)
- Winston’s relationship with Julia is a type of loyalty that is tested by the events of the book (betray her by
stopping loving her)
Independence And Identity
- Party controls independence and identity
- Winston does not know how old he is, whether he is married or not, whether his mother is alive or dead, no
childhood memories, no photos or documents
- every member of the Outer Party is identical (same clothing, smoke the same brand of cigarettes, drink the
same brand of gin)
- Winston is trying to build his own identity (diary is an attempt to create memory and history, paperweight is
a desire to have something of his own that represents a time before the Party, relationship with Julia and their
decision to rent an apartment where they can spend time together)
- at Ministry of Love they destroy all aspects of his individuality
Doublethink
- psychological manipulation
- ability to hold two contradictory ideas in one’s mind at the same time (believe anything that the Party tells
them)
- for instance the Party ministries’ names: contradict their functions: the Ministry of Plenty oversees
economic shortages, the Ministry of Peace wages war, the Ministry of Truth conducts propaganda and
historical revisionism, and the Ministry of Love is the centre of the Party’s operations of torture and
punishment
Big Brother
- face of the Party
- reassurance to most people (the warmth of his name suggests his ability to protect), but he is also an open
threat (one cannot escape his gaze)
The Glass Paperweight And St. Clement’s Church
- Winston buys a paperweight in an antique store in the prole district
- symbolize his attempt to reconnect with the past
- symbolically, when the Thought Police arrest Winston at last, the paperweight shatters on the floor
- old picture of St. Clement’s Church in the room that Winston rents above Mr. Charrington’s shop is another
representation of the lost past
- associates a song with the picture that ends with the words “Here comes the chopper to chop off your
head!”
- foreshadow, as it is the telescreen hidden behind the picture that ultimately leads the Thought Police to
Winston
The Red-Armed Prole Woman
- Winston hears her singing through the window represents Winston’s one legitimate hope for the long-term
future
- he imagines her giving birth to the future generations that will finally challenge the Party’s authority
- the proles are hope for better future

My opinion
- well written, easy to follow, catchy theme (very important and serious topic), characters descripted only by
few mysterious information (the only character whom we really get to know is Winston)
- helps to create a mysterious and thrilling atmosphere (also the tone, the despair of society and the cruelty of
The Party)
- the parallel with Russia is also very interesting
- eventhough it is clear from the very beginning that Winston will eventually end up being arrested by the
Though Police, it is an absolutely captivating and well written story