Smith 1

Cyndil Smith

Gilchrist 3rd

AP English IV

28 March 2005

George Orwell’s 1984

“The system of organized lying on which society is founded.”

George Orwell, the pseudonym for Eric Arthur Blair, is best known for his political

convictions and public opposition to totalitarianism. He made a name for himself in Britain by

publishing works based on his own life experiences, but became widely known around the world

just before he died after writing the dystopian novel 1984. Orwell’s “political fable” is projected

in a tone that resonates of threat, warning, and despair. Since the novel was first published in

1949, the terrifying message of a world completely controlled by an omnivorous government, a

government Denis Donoghue calls “a system which perpetuates itself without human

intervention” (60) where “the individual is a mere function of itself,” (62) has been contemplated

by critics and the general public alike. Most people are horrified to think the world could

someday devolve into that which this novel depicts. Orwell’s writing is plausible because it

reflects facts: aspects of the novel can be closely paralleled with Europe during WWII,

especially Orwell’s Britain, and the direction he believed it was headed. However, Averil

Gardener writes that Orwell claims his purpose was not to prophesy that “the kind of society [he

describes] necessarily will arrive,” but to warn “something resembling it could arrive—if not

fought against” (111). This warning is so effective because of its haunting similarities to

wartime Europe and the straightforward, emotional violence Orwell inflicts upon the reader.
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When commenting on the writing of George Orwell, it is almost impossible not to draw

parallels to his remarkable life. Born into what he cleverly dubbed the “lower-upper-middle

class,” he received the best education his family could offer at Eton, a prestigious school which

offered the opportunity to further his education at Oxford or Cambridge. Orwell did not attend

university, however. He chose instead to join the Indian Imperial Police in Burma as an assistant

superintendent. He resented being the “hand of the oppressor” and resigned after five years of

service. He later put himself among the tramps and beggars of France and England, exploring

the depths of society first-hand. Most of Orwell’s earlier works reflect the experiences of this

phase of his life: the time when he was directly affected by and personally experiencing what he

would later use to shape the world of 1984. Throughout his life, Orwell became a master of

isolation: choosing the lonely life of a writer, putting himself in the lowest of the low class,

joining the Indian Imperial Police despite his adamant convictions about the wrong that is

orthodoxy, even attempting to get himself arrested as a drunk in order to learn more about life in

prison.

Orwell’s experiences allowed him to write, without falter, of a world in which the

government desires only power—in his novel, “power entirely for its own sake” (217). In the

novel, a revolution has taken place and a select elite, the Party, has put itself in charge of the total

state. The globe has been divided among three territories: Eastasia, Eurasia, and Oceania—

where Winston lives and the Party flourishes. The novel takes place in what is supposed to have

once been London and is now known as Airstrip One. The Thought Police are a ruthless form of

law enforcement infamous for disposing of people who express too much individualism or form

alliances which may threaten the Party’s principles. Critic Jenni Calder asserts that Airstrip One

“resembles wartime Britain in both its sense of emergency and its dreariness” (35): it is a land of
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“burst pipes and inadequate rubbish disposal; a land plagued with drabness, grimy streets, filthy

rooms, bad smells, sour tastes, chocolate rations, and an overall pervasive dreariness of the

country” (Calder 36). These were a part of Orwell’s life before, during, and immediately after

the war, and a staple throughout Winston’s entire existence. “The Party in 1984 brought a

revolution which brought little benefit to the ordinary lives of ordinary people” (Calder 36). This

can be seen as a comment of the failure of the British Prime Minister after the war, Clement

Richard Attlee, and his government “to give English society any real vitality” (Donoghue 59).

The Ministry of Truth and its power to rewrite history as it deems necessary and proper is most

likely a satire of the British Ministry of Information during the war and the lies purveyed by

BBC that “all [British] aircraft returned home safely” (Donoghue 60) after bombing raids on

German cities.

These parallels can be seen not only in England, but also in other parts of Europe. Joseph

Stalin, the ruggedly handsome dictator of Russia who gained “not only historical but

mythological status” (Donoghue 59) can be compared to the almost god-like level at which

Oceania holds its leader, Big Brother. Emmanuel Goldstein, a man who was once a member of

high regard in the Inner Party but exiled as a traitor to Big Brother, can be closely compared with

Leon Trotsky, commissar of foreign affairs in Russia before being accused of heading a plot

against the Stalinist regime. In his essay entitled “1984: Enigmas of Power,” Irving Howe

comments on the methods of “alternation between physical beatings and sympathetic

conversations” (96) used in the Ministry of Love which mirror those used by the NKVD, the

Soviet secret police. “Russia’s choosing to oppress its people by economic privation, police

intimidation, and surveillance” (Gardener 120) are all aspects of 1984 which ring a familiar bell

with its readers. The oppression of the sex instinct by the Communist Party resembles the
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attempt by the Party to make sex into a dirty, evil institution. The ever-shifting alliances of

Oceania, Eurasia, and Eastasia can be traced to the same inconsistency in the alliances of Russia

and Germany. There is also a similarity to the famous photograph of “The Big Three” in Yalta;

Winston, Roosevelt, and Stalin being compared to Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford in the

photograph which Winston believes is the key to unseating the Party.

It is arguable that perhaps Winston, the main character of 1984, is a reflection of Orwell’s

lifestyle. The world which the Party has created for its inhabitants has all but obliterated the

institutions of friendship, love, family, marriage, and sex. It has molded the minds of its citizens

to respond simultaneously and in unison to any stimuli and in any manner the Party deems

appropriate. John Knapp relates that the inhabitants have such an extreme fear of the

government that they “repress every contrary thought in the vain hope that they will not be

discovered by the Thought Police” (2063). This extreme form of isolation “has crippled

Winston’s psychological and sexual life, [. . .] made him so ambivalent about his own existence

that he would do nothing to save his own life,” (Knapp 2062) and caused him to believe he is

completely alone in his subversive feelings towards the government. His real convictions do not

surface fully until he is approached by Julia, a young woman who has fallen for Winston and

with whom he forms a dangerous liaison. What he feels for her is not love, however, but only

“lustful affection mixed with a mild annoyance” (Knapp 2061). She will never understand his

way of thinking, nor he hers. The two believe they are in love because they share a common

hatred for a common evil—they will never share any kind of intellectual or spiritual connection.

In this way, the Party has succeeded: it has made its inhabitants incapable of establishing

anything other than a “shallow, immature relationship” (Knapp 2063) with one another. Only

O’Brien, a member of the Inner Party who kindles Winston’s rebellious inclinations and betrays
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him ruthlessly, is presented as somewhat of a friend to Winston. It is both incomprehensible and

ironic that the man who entraps and later tortures Winston is the man with whom the reader feels

Winston makes the strongest connection. We see how absurd life has become in this miserable

world controlled entirely by the government, and convince ourselves that this could never

become a reality.

Many aspects of the novel encourage us to rethink our opinion, however. Jenni Calder

asserts that “Orwell’s imagination rarely takes off from reality” (32). Though many critics may

think this would be detrimental to Orwell’s ability to tell a compelling story, the most fear-

inducing aspect of 1984 is that it doesn’t paint an unbelievable picture. Because he does not

stray too far from reality, Orwell’s message is conveyed all the more efficiently. “Many of the

descriptive passages in 1984 were simply taken over, with a degree of stretching here and there,

from Orwell’s earlier books or from his life-long caustic observations of 20th century England”

(Howe 96). Orwell’s Airstrip One does not seem unrealistic because throughout history many

self-perpetuating governments and rulers have attempted to domesticate the idea of a total state.

“That in its fundamental conception it should now seem so familiar, so ordinary, so plausible, is

—when you come to think of it—a deeply unnerving fact about the time in which we live”

(Howe 97). Julia Symons writes in a review for the Times Literary Supplement

We can generally view projections of the future with detachment because they seem to

refer to people altogether unlike ourselves. By creating a world in which the “proles”

still have their sentimental songs and their beer, and the privileged still consume their

Victory gin, Orwell involves us most skilfully (sic) and uncomfortably in his story. (qtd.

in Howe 96)
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In other words, Orwell creates a world we can someday see ourselves inhabiting, thereby forcing

upon us the notion that we must strive against this world.

Nevertheless, other critics have argued that Orwell does not draw a conceivable enough

picture: Raymond Williams says that 1984 lacks “a substantial society and correspondingly

substantial persons” (Howe 98). Assertions such as these hint at a failure to grasp the message of

the novel. In the world Orwell has created, it is evident that “substantial society and [. . .]

persons” have been suppressed so heavily that they have become virtually extinct. The purpose

of the Party is to wipe out all sense of individualism until there is a total state run by an elite who

has mastered and surpassed the concept of the individual. “As it happens, we have come close

enough during the last half-century to a society like Oceania for the prospect of its realization to

be within reach of the imagination. And that is all a writer of fiction needs” (Howe 98). There

are moments while reading 1984 that we begin to ask ourselves “Could this really happen?”

This is the moment where we find ourselves between what Howe refers to as “minimal credence

and plummeting disbelief” (99). If Orwell can make us forget even for a moment that it is a

fictional novel we are reading, then he has succeeded and his warning has been sufficiently

heeded.

If Orwell can bring us to this point, he can also bring us to put ourselves in the story. As

readers we relate to Winston’s rebellion, his desire for love, and his being oppressed by the

government. We are conflicted throughout the work because we understand he will never

overcome the Party—just at the moment when we begin to think there may be some chance that

Winston and Julia will be together somewhat happily, this illusion is shattered by the Thought

Police. We always have some hope for improvement, for a revolution which isn’t possible.

Though we know it is futile, we continue to cheer Winston on and urge him to fight against the
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Party even after he is captured and endures torture from the very man who led him to the

Brotherhood.

Though different critics will always have differing views on the true message of 1984, it

is widely accepted as “a depiction of a dehumanized world” (Donoghue 57). Orwell wanted to

give his readers “A warning of what the future might bring if we allow ‘Englishness’ or any sort

of individuality to wither away” (Donoghue 57). Orwell’s satire becomes plausible when we

realize that his message is a true satire: Orwell exposes human folly by eradicating the human

spirit. He warns that we must strive against this type of devolution if we hope to preserve

humanity.
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Works Cited

Calder, Jenni. “Orwell: The Man.” 25-38.

Donoghue, Denis. “Nineteen Eighty-Four: Politics and Fable.” 57-69.

George Orwell & Nineteen Eighty-Four. Washington: Library of Congress, 1985.

Gardener, Averil. “Chapter Seven: The Last Man in Europe: Nineteen Eighty-Four.” George

Orwell. Ed. Kinley E. Roby. Boston: Twayne, 1987. 110-123.

Howe, Irving. “1984: Enigmas of Power.” 1984 Revisited: Totalitarianism in Our Century.

Harper, 1983. Rpt. In Modern Critical Interpretations: George Orwell’s 1984. Ed.

Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House, 1987. 95-107.

Knapp, John V. “George Orwell.” Critical Survey of Long Fiction, vol. 5, 2nd ed. Ed. Frank N.

Magill. Englewood Cliffs: Salem, 1983. 2061-2063.

Orwell, George. 1984. New York: Penguin, 1949.