Dystopian Control Over Society in Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four In most dystopian novels, a control over society is clearly represented, whether it be the controlling of citizen activities, or the watching over of citizens and their actions. Dystopian literature also includes one interesting aspect in their reads. They include a protagonist that wants to break free of their ties to the controlled society and find out if there is a world or society that is beyond the one that they are living in, even if it means death. Winston Smith, the protagonist in the novel, is constantly exposed to these dystopian controls. Whether it be the use of telescreens, the altering of historical events, or the changing of the society's language in George …show more content…
In the novel, telescreens are recognized as the eyes and ears of Big Brother, the leader of Oceania. They watch the protagonist’s every move and pick up any sound made by the main character, even if it is just the scratching of the back. These telescreens can also broadcast people live as they give commands to their viewers. It is an ingenious way to control society since everyone is required to have a telescreen in their living space, including the protagonist Winston. One day Winston is ‘hectored’ by a gymnastics mistress to do the full stretch in his Daily Jerks, a daily exercise program broadcasted on the telescreen, “The gymnastics mistress who hectors Winston from the telescreen during the Physical Jerks…” (Hunt 5-6). The use of the word ‘Hector’, by Hunt, depicts that she is talking to him in a controlling way, bullying him to stretch the full length during the Physical Jerks. When Winston is out of view of these telescreens, he likes to write in a diary about what he is thinking at the current moment. Winston’s first diary entry is about war-flicks he had seen the previous day on the telescreen, “Winston’s first diary entry is an account of the ‘‘war-flicks’’ seen the previous day. He recalls the spectacle of refugees being machine-gunned at sea, and a man desperately trying to swim to safety before being riddled with bullets” (Hunt 8-9). War-flicks are a common practise of propaganda, …show more content…
In Winston´s state Oceania, there is a building called the ministry of truth, where the altering of history occurs. One day as Winston is doing his Daily Jerks, his mind starts to drift into the past where he remembers that Oceania had been in an alliance with Eurasia, but at the current time, The Party’s ministry of truth claims that they had never had an alliance with Eurasia, and have always been enemies of the state, “The party said that Oceania had never been in alliance with Eurasia as short a time as four years ago. But where did that knowledge exist? Only in his own consciousness” (Orwell 37). In the quote, the narrator admits that the knowledge of Oceania being in alliance with Eurasia is now only in Winston’s consciousness, meaning that that information was either not true to begin with, or was changed by the ministry of truth. If Winston can not prove that this exists, then it does not, which is why it is so easy for The Party to control the population by just saying it never happened, and with no proof to support that it did, a dystopian loop of lies from the past is created to rival what the protagonist and population really believe about the past, and what really happened. A few days later, Winston is at work as the narrator explains three openings in the walls of his cubicle, one of them being called the “memory hole”, where any scrap paper is
Towards the end of Orwell’s novel that presents a dystopian society, the antagonist, O’Brien, a close member of the inner party, warns Winston, the protagonist and one of only two reasonable people left, that “We do not merely destroy our enemies; we change them” (319). Winston, who has been taken prisoner for his political dissent, receives this grave warning tied down to a chair with O’Brien’s face staring at him from above. This alarming solution to the infamous mystery frightens Winston a significant amount, who after sacrificing so much, has just learned his fate. Orwell has brought about this fate to emphasize the perpetual triumph of the party over its enemies. In George Orwell's 1984, the author creates the totalitarian state of Oceania to warn the reader of the potential corruption and oppression of such a government.
“BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU”(Orwell 2), is a saying that surrounds society in the classic novel 1984. The author, George Orwell provides his audience with an abundant amount of themes throughout his writing. One very prominent one is Orwell’s psychological manipulation of his characters. As characters within this society are constantly surrounded by sayings such as, “WAR IS PEACE”, “FREEDOM IS SLAVERY”, and “IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH”(Orwell 4), Orwell shows the ultimate type of control within his characters. Orwell is able to achieve such psychological manipulation in his characters through physical control and the abundance of technology. Without Orwell’s use of telescreens, his characters would be able to have their
The telescreens in the novel are everywhere and they can see everything that people do. This relates to today’s times because of all the technology that has emerged. Phones, for examples, can now tell a person where they have been and how long they were there. This connects back to 1984 with the fact that now; people are basically carrying around telescreens in their pockets. The telescreens in 1984 watched over the proles and members of both inner and outer party, just like cell phones track everyone with a smartphone. Another instance in the novel that relates to today’s world is the telescreen waking you up in the morning. When Winston wakes up one morning and the instructress yells commands to help wake him up, she shouts, “And now let’s see which of us can touch our toes!” (Orwell 33). The relation here is that there are phone applications today that will set off an
Granted the Party can warp laws and control knowledge, its greatest tool for taking away freedoms and controlling the public is its ability to revise history. This idea is displayed throughout the novel, and is fundamental to our understanding of how perfect the Party is. A prime example occurs when Winston is at his job at the Ministry of Truth, the manipulators of history and truth. He contemplates how he simply substitutes one lie for another in his daily work rewriting history, and explains, “And so it was with every class of recorded fact, great or small. Everything faded away into a shadow-world in which, finally, even the date of the year had become uncertain" (Orwell 36). This highlights the genius of the Party’s control; there is no history. As mentioned earlier, the Party controls all publications, and destroys all facts that are not helpful. Much of it is simply fake information that bolsters the Party. Thus, when Winston changes
in the future. Although many in society did not believe what he predicted, most of his predictions have indeed come to pass. Winston Smith, the main character takes the reader to a time that where people are totally controlled by government. Although Winston works for this controlling government, he is one of the few that sees through the plan and denies the evils of Big Brother. The government in Orwell book wants to take complete and utter control of its
George Orwell’s work of fiction 1984 is a futuristic, dystopian novel about citizens living in a totalitarian London. In this society, the government maintains power by controlling as many aspects of its citizens’ lives as it possibly can. The protagonist, Winston Smith, attempts to fight against the government’s controlling ways. For some time, critics have argued that this book was intended as a warning of the scenarios that could emerge if citizens traded freedom for security and allowed governments to take away too many of their rights. 1984 is a powerful warning against the risk of allowing governments to control too many aspects of the lives of their citizens through propaganda and the acquisition of personal information. These methods
Winston Smith, a middle-aged man who works as a records editor in Records Department at the Ministry of Truth, is the novel 's protagonist. He is the character that the reader most identifies with, and the reader sees the world from his point of view. Winston is a kind of innocent in a world gone wrong, and it is through him that the reader is able to understand and feel the suffering that exists in the totalitarian society of Oceania. As a secretly rebellious free thinker, Winston challenges the societal norms placed in the story by the antagonistic government, known as the Party. Orwell wants the reader to be intrigued when vivid descriptions of advanced technology, such as telescreens and hidden microphones, are included in the text providing the feeling of familiarity and pleasure. On the contrary, constant mentions of the tyrannical rule of Big Brother keeps the reader anxious about what will happen to Winston. Furthermore, the Party, the omnipresent ruling system in Oceania, uses several techniques in order to control the minds of the citizens. By exploiting the need to fit in through the use of the Anti-Sex League, the Party is able to suppress resistance to new ideas. The Party also destroyed the ability of citizens to evaluate logically by eliminating any privacy through the form of telescreen surveillance. Finally, through the
Because Winston is a member of the Ministry of Truth, an area of Oceania’s government specifically devoted to spreading lies and propaganda to his society, Winston finds himself in the position of knowing that his government is spreading lies which adds to his overall
Winston knew, from his own knowledge, that Oceania had once been in a mutual agreement with Eurasia however the Party stated that Oceania was never in good terms with Eurasia. This shows how easily the Party can alter the past and create a false history, yet they are also capable of convincing others that the lie they had imposed is actually the truth. Since then, no one would be able to tell the difference between a true or false history; they would only believe what the Party tells them and the revisions of the past altogether. If they said that Oceania and Eurasia were enemies from the beginning of time, other individuals will immediately believe even if it weren't true. In Winston's case, deep within his consciousness, he knows that the
The Party has a device used to control the people to even a greater extent called the telescreen. Winston finds a way to sort of slip around its watch on him when he is alone. "It was terribly dangerous to let your thoughts wander when you were in any public place with range of a telescreen.
Winston Smith is a typical example of vertebrae in the spine of any society. Hard working and keeps a rigid structure by absorbing impact, filling the spaces with his unknown desires. The bending of laws to avoid self-destruction in constant pressure from society and government. The idea of having every thought controlled, monitored and limited to what the elite deem as a necessary compromise to maintain peace and order in Oceania or any other Utopia in a general sense. Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of their own choosing, to understand the concept is the true hell for Winston.
Imagine a world where the government, also called The Party, controls everything the citizens do. The Party monitors their every move by the telescreens that are in every home. Thoughtcrime is the act of thinking something that goes against Big Brother or threatens the Party’s power. If one does commit thoughtcrime, then they Thought Police will capture them and give them consequence. There is no essence of humanity in this world. Everyone is stripped of their own thoughts and told what to do and what to believe. This is the world portrayed in novel
Family is a concept older than recorded time. The fact that humans form familial bonds, take care of their young, and work together to achieve a goal is the reason that humanity has succeeded this far. But maybe for not much longer. In George Orwell’s 1984, a totalitarian government monitors everything that its citizens say, do, and even think in order to prevent revolution and suppress individuality. One of the ways the government achieves this is by destroying all bonds between members in a family by turning the children away from their parents (and towards the government) at a young age. To the government in 1984, a citizen’s closest relationship should be to the party. In fact, a citizens only good relationship should be with the party.
Bringing up the children and making them members of the Spies gives them sense of belonging and all they live for is to serve the Party. This leaves no room for freedom in homes because they only know how to obey Big Brother. Even Parson's kids burnt a market selling woman's skirt for using a paper containing Big Brother's picture as a sausage wrapper (Part 1, Chapter 5, 79). This example emphasises that Big Brother's dominion over the children cannot be
In the novel 1984 there are different types of Dystopias going on. Winston Smith is the main character in this novel. Winston lives in a world where he is constantly watched by surveillance and is basically told how to live and what to do. In a dystopian society , propaganda is used to control the people living within the society. Winston on the other hand is protagonist and feels like the world he lives in is weird or isn't right. The types of dystopian controls in this novel is Technological Control , Totalitarian Control , and Bureaucratic Control.