Preview

Utopia In George Orwell's 1984

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
637 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Utopia In George Orwell's 1984
In the year of 1949, George Orwell saw a possible future from his reflection of the totalitarian regimes of World War II and experience in Spain as well as Russia, especially with Stalin. This would culminate into the novel known as 1984, in which the Party and their leader – Big Brother – have complete control of the nation known as Oceania, where everyone is under constant surveillance by the Thought Police. The story is set in London which has decayed just as much as the people’s souls and minds, shown as a “negative utopia”. Just before the end of the novel, the protagonist known as Winston Smith is being tortured by the Party operative O’Brien until he adheres to the Party’s mentality, admits crimes he has not even committed, broken inside, and has only “love” for Big Brother. The government wants completely control and so must assert their power upon people such as Smith. So this is where the motif known as doublethink becomes truly clear. It is the idea where one believes one idea yet another at the same time which contradicts it as with a lie and believing it is not a lie showing conviction as if it were true. Now, given is another example is where Smith is tortured which is the Ministry of Love. Here O’Brien tells Smith, “Reality exists in the human mind, and …show more content…
“Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past” must than hold true. The past affects the future and so if in the present, the past is rewritten then the future is altered, as then those in the present can gain something from a rewritten past. This shows the power of manipulation in which the Party has over their people as the idea of rebellion is a crime and so hope is not even dim in the practically perfect totalitarian

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Better Essays

    1984, being written at a time where Stalin and Hitler were forces to be reckoned, many knew what could happen if these two ever trusted their way into power. Orwell uses satirical themes in his book to relate to what was going on at present time. Totalitarianism was something to be feared. In this novel where it was a complete totalitarianism society, Winston struggles with ‘Big Brother’ having complete control. “His pen had slid voluptuously over the smooth paper, printing in large neat capitals—DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER (18)”. The fight over ones true identity was also a theme that arose throughout the novel. Orwell mocks the ability for people to not become individuals…

    • 1906 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    In a totalitarian government, the people are not living in a reality, but rather the inverse, they are living in a reality made for them. 1984 by George Orwell is a story of Winston Smith's struggle against a totalitarian government that controls the ideas and thoughts of its citizens. In the mythical setting of Oceania, the Party is the ruling, and Big Brother is the fictitious leader that controls all the thoughts and actions of human life. The people's rebellious thoughts and actions are most likely suppressed, but that can only go so far for a totalitarian government. In the novel 1984, Oceania is controlled by a totalitarian government, which is similar to the government systems of Nazi Germany and North Korea because they used torture and food shortage.…

    • 968 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the novel 1984, author George Orwell makes many predictions as to what society would conform to in the year 1984. Although these predictions are jurassic and farfetched, many of Orwell's predictions are expressed in our modern day American society. 1984 showcases the empowerment of a totalitarian government. The main Character, Winston, lives in a society where the government controls every aspect of his life, ranging from his food to his razor portions, and even his thoughts.…

    • 490 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    John F. Kennedy once said, "conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth." 1984, a dystopian novel, was written by George Orwell. Remarkably ahead of its time with an ancient publication date of 1949, the novel deals with very modern ideas such as the government overreaching its power, and the rise of technology. The author utilizes the backdrop of an extremely oppressive, totalitarian government named Big Brother to demonstrate that humanity naturally desires nonconformity, but when put in the worst of scenarios, chooses conformity out of self-preservation.…

    • 937 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    In 1984 by George Orwell, novelist and essayist creates a dystopian novel that features his frightening vision in 1949 of the world we were soon to become. Orwell’s purpose in this passage is to convey the effect of Winston's stolen and mysterious past. Orwell uses foreshadows and symbols. He adopts a nostalgic and mysterious tone in order to hypothesize a horrific ending.…

    • 397 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Rather than just being a commentary on the setting of the book, it is also the musings of a man being driven insane. All of this extract is told from the perspective of Winston Smith as he first begins to question the party and to think for himself. As the book began, Winston was the average Party drone, albeit quite tired of propaganda and zealots. The passing of this moment in Nineteen Eighty-Four seems to mark Winston’s evolution as a character, from an absent-minded consumer of Party propaganda to a free-thinking individual (as much as it has also marked him for…

    • 588 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Orwell vision of 1984 was shaped by his experiences though out his time as a volunteer in the Spanish civil war and upon returning to Britain post-war when the country was a place of shortages and rationing. Orwell struggled against fascism, but was intent on destroying its anarchist and Trotskyist allies. The defeat of fascism involved the success of and the emergence of the USSR as a great power. Orwell was deeply concerned about this fact. Orwell remained a believer in the fundamental goodness of the “common people”, the workers or “proles”. Due to Orwell’s personal circumstances, his fading life expectancy from tuberculosis may have influenced the bleak creation of the world that is “1984”.…

    • 791 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In his dystopian novel 1984, Orwell expresses his vision of the nearing future through a fictional plot. Within the plot, Winston Smith, the novel's protagonist, lives a life controlled entirely by a manipulative and exploitative government. He, embodies the stereotypical personality of each citizen of Oceania—a person who abides by the laws of the ruling Big Brother government. Through the developing setting and characterization of our protagonist, the reader is able to witness the numerous aspects of control, manipulation and exploitation exercised by the Party and Big Brother. As his frustrations with the Party's control of history and longing desire to meet with a…

    • 2540 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Beyond Big Brother

    • 882 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The novel 1984 by George Orwell is a political satire on Communist Russia and the Soviet Union; this concept is explored throughout the book with The Party, Oceanians totalitarian government that rules through fear and oppression of its citizens in similar ways as to what was happening in the real world at the time. When Orwell was writing 1984 in 1948 he was influenced by the information coming out about Stalinism and what the Soviet Union had really been doing.…

    • 882 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    A certain theme that stuck out a lot in this book was the "Physical control" of the bodies of its subjects. Winston, is followed and looked over by the Party, everywhere he goes. They constantly watch to see if he makes any sign of disloyalty, so that if he does, they would arrest him. The Party forces their members to go through tough, heavy morning exercises, called Physical Jerks. After that, the members would work long grueling days at the government agencies, and would be in the state of exhaustion. The Party brutally beats and tortures the humans if they manage to defy the Party. On Page 245, there is a scene showing how O'Brien has physical control over Winston.…

    • 1252 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Nineteen Eighty-Four is a dystopian novel about the life of a man named Winston Smith. Winston Smith is living under the totalitarian government, the Inner Party, in a land called Oceania. This totalitarian government has ideology called INGSOC, which it uses to obtain complete power. Within this ideology there are the Four Sacred Principles. They are: the mutability of the past, doublethink, newspeak, and the denial of objective reality. All four of these methods are intertwined and are used together, by the Inner Party, to achieve their ideology of INGSOC and to acquire absolute control over the people living in Oceania.…

    • 963 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Orwell Dystopia essay

    • 1231 Words
    • 4 Pages

    George Orwell 1984 novel demonstrates a dystopia futuristic world call Oceania where the government seeks total control of its citizen by using power, manipulation of the memory and the past and by putting fear into their citizen. Orwell achieved his goals but showing us the value system of the protagonist versus the antagonist…

    • 1231 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    How did the party use control to maintain the society? George Orwell’s 1984 is a novel about a totalitarian dystopian society where the people have no freedom, always on constant surveillance by “Big Brother” and are constantly being brainwashed. Where “no one is free, even the birds are chained to the sky.” In the novel 1984, George Orwell shows how the party uses control to maintain society and place fear upon the society. In 1984 the party uses fear, torture, the control over sex instinct, propaganda to control and maintain order in the society.…

    • 538 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Take for instance, Mr. Charrington who Winston first bought his diary and pen in his store, Winston thought he is an old man who is interested in history and the past only to find that he was leading him to his trap by allowing him to rent the room above the store he owns. He observed all Winston and Julia’s actions and then denounced them to the other Thought Police members. He then reveals himself as a member of the Thought Police at the end when Winston and Julia get arrested [Chapter 2, p156]. Winston trusted Mr. Charrignton and thought he is an ordinary prole who is only interested in history and did not care about the party. He did not think that a party member will live in that part of the country and did not consider that Big Brother is watching…

    • 1165 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Hunger, pain, and desperation ravaged the nation of China during its two major revolutions in the twentieth century. However this time had also been a time of prosperous advances in technology and a significant rise in reputation and population. The People's Republic of China went through a drastic change in culture and as a nation under a communist government. The methods that this government had used under Mao Zedong's direction, can also be seen used by the government in ‘1984', a novel by George Orwell. Both governments used their powers to control their nation and citizens to an extreme. Under Mao Zedong's government, the Chinese suffered from state-controlled media, destruction of traditional cultural practices and the subversion of youth,…

    • 988 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays