Totalitarian states need power to survive. The societies of Huxley’s Brave New World and Orwell’s 1984 create power using two different methods: pleasure and fear, respectively. However, there is a common thread between both worlds. Both states recognize and abuse human nature and human relationships to facilitate continual power. Huxley and Orwell warn about the methods totalitarian states use to obtain power. The characters of John and Winston reveal the incompatibility of authoritarian power and human relationships. Strong emotions, such as grief and love, stemming from human relationships transform both characters into rebelling against their society. Both societies prevent them from forming loyalties to curb rebellion by making them seem …show more content…
The values of both societies prevent John and Winston from forming loyalties, showing the incompatibility of human relationships and power. Huxley’s view of power, through the use of commodification, is subtle. The World State indoctrinates people into believing in infantile sexual interactions and constant renewal of everything. When John asks Lenina to “make a promise to live together always. . . outliving beauty’s outward, with a mind that doth renew swifter” (Huxley 168), she replies in disgust. John’s view of genuine human relationships is living with the love of his life for a long period of time. He insinuates that relationships create long-lasting loyalty. However, Lenina is taught to constantly want new things and constantly change partners. Thus, the World State’s values prevent any long-term relationships forming as the people are easily disinterested. The World State essentially turns love and relationships into an exercise of commodification, where they give up old things when they get bored. John, of course, desires an intimate long-term relationship and he vows to love Lenina even when she grows old. However, because of the World State’s values, no one can gain a long-term relationship because everything is treated as a commodity. The removal of long-term relationships prevent loyalties which lead to rebellion. Huxley uses this to warn against governments using instant …show more content…
John is a very strong character who rebels because he believes in meaningful human relationships. However, without anyone to share his views, he is overwhelmed by the power of the World State’s indoctrinations. The people’s collective unity and the element of pleasure make John submit. He has no relationships around him that would support his rebellion. He is one person fighting against a mob of indoctrinated people. When John fights against the World State, “somebody started singing ‘Orgy-porgy’ and, in a moment, they had all caught up the refrain and, singing, had begun to dance. Orgy-porgy, round and round and round, beating one another in six-eight time. Orgy-porgy” (Huxley 228). The people overwhelm John with their united chants and acts of sexual pleasure. John has no choice but to join in because of the nature of social pressure and pleasure. This quote emphasizes the number of people around John in this bombarding chant that heightens the effect of social pressure on him. It is after pressuring John and enticing him with pleasure that he submits to the World State values, unknowingly. The power of collective unity and pleasure force a strong character, like John, to lose because an individual cannot fight against the brainwashed force of the society. John cannot fight because he has no one who shares
Through his failure, Orwell portrays the dangers of a disunited society for the individual. Even though Winston willingly chose to oppose the Party and offered his life towards the eradication of his oppressors, his sacrifice proved futile without communal support to usurp the tyrannical regime. Despite the common suffering the people endured, their fear of the individual torment each would suffer motivated them to submit to the government. In Winston, Orwell highlights the frailty of an individual person in comparison to a mob. When imprisoned at the Ministry of Love, Winston’s will crumbled under torture and he even offered the life of the one individual he had earlier seemed hesitant to sacrifice, Julia. Hence, Orwell illustrates the need for a united social front for individuals to change the society in which they live in. Otherwise, self-preservation shall remain dominant within each individual, leaving them vulnerable to continuous manipulation through propaganda.
The novel “1984” by George Orwell exemplifies the issues of a government with overwhelming control of the people. This government controls the reality of all of their citizens by rewriting the past, instilling fear, and through manipulation. This is an astounding story because of the realistic qualities that are present throughout the text about an extreme regulatory government and its effects. This society is overwhelming consumed with the constructed reality that was taught to them by Big Brother. George Orwell brings significant aspects to the novel like the complexity of relationships during a rebellion and The Party’s obsession with power. The main character Winston struggles throughout the story trying to stay human through literature, self-expression and his individuality. The party uses human’s tendencies, weaknesses, and strengths in order to dehumanize their citizens to gain control over them.
In the novel 1984, George Orwell sets up a dystopia that reveals basic human qualities occur even when the people are brainwashed out of the,. This story takes place in an alternate society where life is radically different than what the world is today. The government has an extreme control on its people, brain washing them and suppressing every aspect of human connection. The citizens are taught to think that all information from the government is true even when it is blatantly obvious it isn’t. This novel allows the reader to witness the genesis of a primal love through the action of rebellion. Winston and Julia fall in love with each other as the book continues.
In the novel 1984, Orwell produced a social critique on totalitarianism and a future dystopia that made the world pause and think about our past, present and future. When reading this novel we all must take the time to think of the possibility that Orwell's world could come to pass. Orwell presents the concepts of power, marginalization, and resistance through physical, psychological, sexual and political control of the people of Oceania. The reader experiences the emotional ride through the eyes of Winston Smith, who was born into the oppressive life under the rule of Ingsoc. Readers are encouraged through Winston to adopt a negative opinion on the idea of communist rule and the inherent dangers of totalitarianism. The psychological
George Orwell’s 1984 published in 1949 is one of the important novels in the twentieth century, since author’s vision is satirist and prophetic that it is one of the most powerful warnings ever issued against the dangers of a totalitarian society. During the WWII, George Orwell witnessed the rise to power of dictators such as Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin of the nightmarish atrocities committed by fascist political regimes, and inspired his mounting hatred of totalitarianism and political authority; therefore, in novel 1984, Orwell uses the characterization of the main character, Winston Smith, to show that an extreme totalitarian government can destroy one’s morals, beliefs, and self-worth. Like Aldous Huxley’s
Although the phrase of “every one belongs to every one else” (Huxley 43) is used by the society of the World State to show social conformity and unity, multiple cases of alienation and isolation are present among the main characters within the novel. In the World State, people live “where everyone is happy, but no one is free” (“Brave New World”). In the beginning of the novel, readers are introduced to Bernard Marx, who is conditioned to be an alpha, one of the highest rankings in the social ladder, but is alienated because of his size and anti-social approach to the civilized lifestyle lived out by the majority of his colleagues. Bernard’s characterization by Huxley sanctions the reader to enter into the controlling society of the World State. Bernard has “erratic attempts to conform to a society in which he feels essentially alienated” (Neilson). Correspondingly, John, the savage, believes in love and marriage, which are values instilled into him by the natives while he lived on the reservation.
Mankind today has many sources predict that the future is likely headed into a world of tyranny, controlled by technology and secretive authorities playing us like marionettes. In the novels 1984 by George Orwell and Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, it explains the stories of two middle aged men, Guy Montag and Winston Smith, who live in dystopian societies where stupidity is conventional and knowledge is a crime. Bradbury teaches his audience that books are extremely vital for knowledge, while Orwell shows how technology and the manipulation of perception can easily be used to brainwash others into believing almost anything. While the high forces attempt to hypnotize everyone, the heroes of the story share similar fates, escape it and realize that the controlling forces in their society are performing an eradication of intelligence and freedom in order to manipulate mankind and they make a stand to fight for the truth.
Any government with total control is worth being feared and having a group of individuals who go against their government. With complete control, a government is capable of committing acts against their citizens, which can be perceived as “something good” from the government’s point of view. In 1984 by George Orwell, and “Harrison Bergeron”, by Kurt Vonnegut, the main characters, Winston and Harrison, feel oppressed by the government's acts and events, try to overthrow their government, and go through a realization of hopelessness and defeat.
Many times in life, things change in ways no one would have expected them to. In the novels 1984 by George Orwell and Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, significant symbols develop different meanings along the course of the books. Both novels are relatively similar and consist of the same theme; the destruction of society due to the immense power that the government has. Even though the authors styles differ, each novel contains different symbols that evolve over time, as well as the same recurring theme of the dangers that come with immense government power.
George Orwell presents us with an interesting portrayal of love in his novel 1984. In the nation of Oceania, the government tries to eradicate love in order to isolate deviation to solely Big Brother. In many ways, it is successful in doing so. The absence of love caused Winston 's marriage with his wife Katharine to be indifferent, cold, and to end in separation. Even occasional affairs that seem to sneak by the Party 's watchful eyes, like Winston and Julia 's, are eventually stopped and the two are forced to stop loving each other. Perhaps, the strongest love that remains in Oceania is the love of Big Brother. This love is displayed when Winston is tortured by O 'Brien so that
In the two classic dystopian novels 1984 by George Orwell and Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, the authors write about tyrannical governments which terrorize their citizens. As well as that, both authors comment on the psychological and sociological ramifications that censorship has on members of society. Orwell’s outspokenness against totalitarians and social injustices combined with Bradbury’s knowledge of censoring governments due to the McCarthy scandal and Stalin’s reign of terror led to their reflection on what the world may succumb to if these events continued to occur. The protagonists, Winston Smith in 1984 and Guy Montag in Fahrenheit 451, attempt to liberate themselves and the societies in which they live from their oppressive and
Love is both the foundation and the weakness of a totalitarian regime. At the heart of any totalitarian society, love between two individuals is eliminated because only a relationship between the person and the party and a love for its leader can exist. The totalitarian society depicted throughout the Orwell’s novel 1984 has created a concept of an Orwellian society. Joseph Stalin’s Soviet regime in Russia can be described as Orwellian. The imaginary world of Oceania draws many parallels to the modern day totalitarian regime established by Stalin. For example, in the novel it was the desire of the Party to eliminate love and sex, in order to channel this pent-up passion towards the love of Big Brother. Similarly, Stalin used propaganda
Two classic novels, 1984 written by George Orwell and Brave New World penned by Aldous Huxley both possess similar topics and themes. In both novels societies are striving for a utopia, or a perfect society. These novels also take place in societies with versions of totalitarian governments, which is a government that rules by coercion. Not only are the topics similar, but in both novels a rebellious character is the protagonist; Winston Smith from 1984 and John the Savage in Brave New World. Another parallel in the books are the tactics that the government uses to instill fear and power over the citizens. A common theme expressed in Orwell’s novel 1984 and Huxley’s novel Brave New World is that government uses
Love is the foundation and the weakness of a totalitarian regime. For a stable totalitarian society, love between two individuals is eliminated because only a relationship between the person and the party and a love for its leader can exist. The totalitarian society depicted throughout the Orwell’s novel 1984 has created a concept of an Orwellian society. Stalin’s Soviet state can be considered Orwellian because it draws close parallels to the imaginary world of Oceania in 1984. During the twentieth century, Soviet Russia lived under Stalin’s brutal and oppressive governments, which was necessary for Stalin to retain power. In both cases, brutality and oppression led to an absence of relationships and love. This love was directed towards
Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World”, and George Orwell’s “1984” both portray totalitarian regimes who strive for complete control over their population. The methods that they use to achieve this are almost polar opposites. While one uses war/bombing, thought/relationships, and through the dreaded room 101 as a means of control, the other uses sex/orgies, relationships, and soma to establish order throughout the population.