George Orwell, Summary PDF

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GEORGE ORWELL Life: in 1903 he was born in India and then he returned to England to his mother and sister, where he attended the Eton schoold. 1922-27: he served in Britain’s imperial police force in India  he starts feeling hostile to imperialism, so he wished to become a writer: he returned to Europe and had a series of joy while his works continued to be rejected by the publishers. 1936: Orwell went to Spain to fight for the Republicans against the Fascists in the Spanish Civil War  after his return to England he continued his work of writer and journalist. 1943-45: he became a literary editor and contributed to other newspapers  1950: he died in London

NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR (1948) - Plot: it describes a dystopian world in which every aspect of the individual’s life is controlled by omnipresent eyes and ears of the State  the book can be divided in 3 sections. The protagonist is Winston Smith and in the first section we learn, through his own reflections, of his life in a post revolutionary London (the capital of Aristrip One, in the superstate of Oceania)  Oceania is a totalitarian state ruled by an ominous organization known as The Party: Oceania and the two other superstates, Eurasia and Eastasia, are involved in a continous war and constantly change alliances. As the novel progresses it emerges that the war is an illusion mantained by the governments of these 3 superstates in order to keep their respective people in a state of subjections  Winston is a member of the Outer Party, a section of the Party which is involved to making sure that “the Party Machine” is running smoothly: everyone of them is systematically brainwashed from a young age and kept under the control by telescreens and the ominous Thought Police. Above the Outer Party are the privileged Inner Party members: who enjoys the fruits of power and production and whose purpose is just to perpetuate the Party’s power  at the very top of the “government” is the enigmatic figure of Big Brother, a man who is noting more tan a face and who appears on posters and screens. Winston is employed at the Ministery of Truth and he’s job consists in the daily rewriting of history: he “corrects the errors” in the past articles of newspapers in order to make the Party appear infallible and consistent. As the novel progresses Smith becomes a “typical modern anti-hero”, but also a powerless indidivual who tries to rebel against the rules of his society  he believes that the only hope lies in the “proles” (proletarians, people who lived outside the Party’s ideological machinery), because in a world where privacy doesn’t exist and unorthodox ideas are punishable by death, his struggle seems hopeless. SECOND PART OF THE BOOK: his rebellion towards a society that banished the love and encouraged sex “takes the form” of a woman, called Julia  they decide to rent a room which appears to have no telescreens and after some times they are inducted by a man called O’Brien into the Brotherhood (a legendary anti-Party organization founded by Goldstein,a former Party member). They got arrested and O’Brien himself turns out to be an Inner Party’s official  Winston is taken to the Ministery of Love, tortured and imprisoned by O’Brien himself: Winston is sent to the Room 101 (the final destination for anyone who opposes the Party: here prisoners are confronted by their worst fears) and here he makes a confession, implicating Julia in the process  Winston is released and after some time he meets Julia again but there is no longer any feeling between them: the novel ends with Winston expressing his enthusiasm for the Party.

Features and Themes: Orwell sets his story in a totalitarian state in the future, but his aim was to describe the political scenario of his own time in a way which made references to the horrors of Nazism and the oppression of Stalinist Russia. 1984’s society is dominated by mass-media’s propaganda and this element has a double function: the first consist in the continous brainwash that the population gets with the paradoxical slogans of the “newspeak” (“war is peace, love is hate, ignorance is power”  distortion of the reality and truth, according to the will of the Party), the second consist in

the constant surveillance of the people (every room is controlled by telescreens and everywhere there are images of the Big Brother, just to remind that he can always see what you are doing, no matters wherever you are).

“Newspeak” and “Doublethink”: Language too plays a crucial role in Orwell’s book  he invented the “newspeak”, a language promoted by the Party in which some words (like “freedom”, “equality”) were banished, in order to minimize the possibility of improper thoughts. “Doublethink” = having two contradictory opinions at the same time about the same issue  the capability to deny and agree with an idea at the same time: “everything is completely true or false, but if you follow the Party’s ideals you won’t fail”....