LAQ 1984

Nineteen Eighty-Four

GENERAL:

1. Winston is the protagonist living in a dystopia. He is not happy with the fact that everyone is watched and monitored. He questions the credibility of the Ministry of Truth. He is a Party member so he works at the office and he corrects newspapers that appear faulty. This world does not allow freedom of thought or liberty or anything for that matter. If you want to have sexual intercourse with your husband, you must go through the paperwork and ask for permission. If you want to fix a leak in the pipes, you have to go through the paperwork and even then you might not get permission for up to two years. Feels a lot like Righetti. One day Winston meets a girl who has physically caught his attention. Winston wants to be with someone in which he can have as much sex as possible. His wife was afraid of sex because she was brought up with the idea that sex is bad and dirty and is only committed to repopulate society. As husband and wife, they had sex a few times and each time it was distasteful for Winston because there was no love in it. SO they left each other. Winston one day gets a note from the girl he is attracted to. The note says, “I Love you.” Winston all of a sudden starts getting fantasies of her. He is fearful that the thought police will find him out but he has already thought the fantasies so why get punished for the mere thought when you can go all the way? So Winston and the girl meet and have sexual intercourse. Her name is Julia and she confesses that this isn’t the first time she has done this…..(ho!) Winston has been thinking rebellious thoughts for a while and he wants to completely over the Ministry of Truth and their version of “Truth”. Julia only wants to outthink the Ministry of Truth but she doesn’t want to bring them down. Anyways, they continue their affair. They know if they get caught, they will go to jail for a really long time or be hanged. Winston doesn’t care because he wants to join the rebels. He talks to a coworker, O’Brien, about meeting. They meet at O’Brien’s house and talk about initiation. He hands Winston a book that is basically the rebels holy bible. Winston takes the book to the rented apartment where Julia and he meet for their erotic encounters. They do the deed and all of a sudden the door gets kicked in by the police. They have been caught. They were tortured by O’Brien, (totally surprised me too!) to the point where they said to torture someone else. In that instant, they loved Big Brother more than each other. Totally weird concept but that’s how I interpreted the torture scene. Anyways, Big Brother broke their will to love each other by breaking and breaking and breaking them some more. Really weird. 
2. Psychological fear is prominent in a totalitarian government. Winston doesn’t want to be caught but he does want to be with a women. He gets caught and tortured with rats. Winston is afraid rats so Big Brother uses fear to control the masses. “In the end the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it (page 239).” Big Brother regulates everything and controls everything so it will get to the point where everything that is taught is false yet people can’t speak out without getting flogged or even killed in the process. Not a very happy place to live in. 
3. Tone is definitely fear and paranoia. Signs everywhere read, “Big Brother is watching you.” There are cameras everywhere and people have the feeling they are being watched because they are being watched by the thought police. At anytime, the Thought Police could be watching you so crime rate is really low. “You had to live—did live, from the habit that became instinct in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and except in darkness, every moment scrutinized (page 7).” People weren’t happy that every second of their lives they had to live in fear, so rebellions ensued. 
4. A) Chiasmus- “War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength (page 10).” This is the political parties slogan and it is obviously a representation of the beliefs of the government. Basically, the government doesn’t want people to think or else they will rebel, again.                                         B) Irony: “The Ministry of Truth” is in charge of news and entertainment and they are more likely to falsify the truth so that the public can be aware of certain things, things the government wants the people to be aware of. “The Ministry of Love was the really frightening one, (page 20)” it is In charge of law and order in the city. This government is the type that would kill an entire office building if someone suggested better working hours or a change from the norm.                                                C) Anaphora: “From the age of uniformity, from the age of solitude, from the age of Big Brother, from the age of doublethink (page 27).”                                                                                                   D) Internal conflict: “His pen had slid voluptuously over the smooth paper, printing in large capitals- Down with Big Brother, Down with Big Brother. He could not help feeling a twinge of panic. It was absurd, since the writing of those particular words was not more dangerous than the initial thought of opening a diary; but for a moment he was tempted to tear out the spoiled pages and abandon the enterprise altogether (page 20).”                                                                                                      E) Dystopia: “Orthodoxy means not thinking-not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconsciousness.”    F) Propaganda: “Two Minutes of Hate (page 50)”                                                                          G) Rhetorical question: “Why did it always have to be like this? Why could he not have a woman of his own instead of these scuffles at intervals of years?”                                                                     H) Diction: “times 3.12.83 reporting bb dayorder doubleplusund good refs unpersons rewrite fulwise upsub antefilling.”                                                                                                                              I) Symbolism-“This simple picture could unravel the entire Party.”                                                        J) Foreshadowing- “One of these days, thought Winston with sudden deep conviction, Syme will be vaporized” 

CHARACTERIZATION:

1. An example of direct characterization are “an enormous face, more than a meter wide; the face of a man about forty, with a heavy black mustache and ruggedly handsome features (page 5).” Another example is a description of O’Brien, “He had the appearance of being a person you could talk to.” An example of indirect characterization is Syme’s psychopathic tendencies, “It was a good hanging (page 44).” By hanging, Syme means that the hanging of people was very entertaining. This quotes goes to show how evil Syme is.
2. Honestly, Winston was pretty creepy. It is first person point of view so the readers can read his every thought. When he first met Julia, he fantasized about raping her, and then cutting out her throat when he climaxed. Yeah totally creepy but Orwell tells the story in a direct and blunt manner. The diction varies. Winston works at the Ministry of Truth so he gets messages from the ministry, in code, telling him to write a certain way. Messages such as “times 3.12.83 reporting bb dayorder doubleplusund good refs unpersons rewrite fulwise upsub antefilling.” You can try to decipher that. Winston has a dictionary of Newspeak that helps him decipher things. Overall, the diction is easy to be understood but there are words that the Ministry of Truth has created that people must use. Words like doublethink or ungood. 
3. Winston is definitely a dynamic character. In the beginning, he supports Big Brother and thinks democracy is some lunatics idea of a joke. After the first few chapter, he unconsciously writes down “Down with Big Brother.” He slowly slips into a rebellious state of mind. At the end, on the very last page, “He had won victory over himself. He had loved Big Brother (page 245).” Very bipolar how he supports Big Brother, hates him, and finally loves him. 
4. George Orwell did a great job of creating a world that is different from ours. It has its own language, Newspeak, and its own government and rules and regulations. Every product has its own name that is different from ours, I.E. victory cigarettes, victory gin, victory burgers (page 10). The fact that there is an appendix in the back just goes to show how in depth Orwell worked to bring to life this world that has gone to war with itself and is now in sham.