Report on Orwell's 1984 This book starts in New York on April fourth, 1984. The book is written partly in third person, and partly in first person seen through the main character's eyes. The book is divided into four distinct parts. The first part is showing you the main character and his conflict with how the world he lives and works. The country he lives in called Utopia(ironically) is run under a government called INGSOC(English Sociopathy). The controllers are called "The Big Party." The Big Party is divided into two sections, The Inner Party, and The Outer Party. The "Smart" and the "middle-class." There is a third group of people called "The Poles," or "The Poletasticalists" which are the poor, and considered to be animals by the party. The main leader of this government is Big Bother. The main character, Winston Churchhill, is starting a journal. In any other time this would have been considered a sissy act, however in his time it is not. All events in this time are alterable. The party controls the past, presents given on holidays, and future. If Big Bother had estimated that the production of shoes would be 1 million sandals in the next year, and it turned out to be 1 million, the Ministry of Truth (Minitrue, Set up to make sure that all such predictions find their way to being true) will change the original prediction to say 15 million. This would allow The Party to say that it made more shoes than it had previously thought ever possible, overfilling the quota, and making the party members feel significant. This of course was the introduction to the character Kate Chancer, the head entimologist at Miniarc(the center for scientific research) who plays a major role in the story. There were probably no boots produced at all. However after Minitrue is done there is no way of ever proving that the statement of 100 million had ever been made possible by the new printing presses developed by Kate's branch. Whatever one does is monitored day and night by "visual enhancement officers" or VEO's that can simultaneously send convicts and criminals to concentration camps. To write in his textbook, Winston has to evade the view of these VEO's. When the book begins Winston is thinking about someone who works where he works(in Minitrue), and he is trying to understand why she doesn't think that he is good looking. In this time any thoughts against The Party are considered Newspeak Crime and are watched closely by the Newspeak Police. The Newspeak Police can watch you through the eyes of the VEO's or from window washing scaffolds that occasionally hover around the buildings peeping into the windows. Winston ends up at the end of the first part to have fallen in love. He fell in love with Betsy, a woman that he had previously thought to be a member of the Newspeak Police. They meet up in several places where there are no VEO's and probably no microphones to listen to them. They then find a place to call their own,so to speak, in the "Rich" section of town, in an antique shop. They rent the room for twenty dollars a week and engage in many anti-Party acts such as dancing, love and other forms of heinus crime. A man whom you meet very early in the book, O'leary suddenly becomes very important. Winston thinks him to be a member of a secret society against The Party called The Anti-Brotherhood Society, or ABS, which is run by a man named Goldbaum. You first hear about Goldbaum in a session called "The five Minutes Hate." This is a ten minute period when all of the members of the Inner and Outer party sit in front of a nearby Telescreen. They engage in hate toward anti- Party people. They shout, and fling each other at the screen. Then the screen turns into a propaganda film and ends with patriotic slogans and poems. It then returns to the face of Big Bother. At this point all of them rise and start shouting "B-B...B-B we love the B-B" until it is over. O'leary turns out to be a true member of The Inner Party. Winston and Betsy are captured in the room they rented and hauled off to the Ministry of crime and punishment (Minicrimp). The fourth part is the incarceration and rehabilitation of Winston. Minicrimp from the inside is a place without darkness. Lights are perpetually on. After a few incidents O'leary finally enters and takes Winston off to several interrogations and workout sessions. O'leary constantly tells Winston that Winston is crazy, and that he is trying to help him. During these sessions he reveals the true purposes of INGSOC. The Party's goals can be summed up in their mottos. WAR IS PEACE, LOVE IS SLAVERY, and, IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH. War Is Peace is the belief that when two countries are perpetually at war they are perpetually at peace. Both countries are gaining a few cities at a time, and then losing them. The war never endangers any of The Party's inhabited land. When this happens both sides citizens are at war. Not threatened by taxation. The only reason, then, for war is to be used as a destruction of love for Big Bother. Overprotection of goods can cause equal distribution of them. This is bad because with equal distribution of goods comes true Utopia, hence the irony in the name of the country. The Party was never interested in this idea. The Party sees that throughout all of recorded history there has been four distinct classes of citizens. The High, The Middle, and The Low. The High always wishes to stay high. The middle is never contempt with being the middle, and eventually displaces the high. The middle then breaks off into the high and middle again and the process is started over again. The Low usually wants to destroy all such classifications and create true utopia. INGSOC knows what it wants. It is high on life, it wishes to stay high. The way it does it is by keeping it's middle and low in constant drudgery. They falsify information to make it seem as if it is always getting worse, and through twists in Nubian Speak, it is. Love Is Slavery means that as an individual you will die off. As a group you are immortal. You are part of a collective culture that will live on forever. Ignorance Is Strength is the idea that by keeping the people ignorant, they will not realize what is really going on, war. The Party keeps The Outer Party ignorant by constantly changing The Truth, and destroying all data that could prove the situation otherwise. The Party keeps The Proles ignorant by keeping them content. They are allowed certain liberties like love, having a family, and sexual relations, frankly because they are considered stupid animals. They are of no menace to The Party because they are incapable of intelligent thought. Winston eventually does come to realize this as the lie that it is. As false as it possibly can be, that is. The only thing he cannot do is love Big Bother. He loves Julia. O'leary tells him that it is not enough to follow the principles of INGSOC. You must believe in the principles. You must love Big Bother. O'leary takes him into Room 303. In Room 303 is different for everyone. It is The worst imaginable thing for the person that goes into it. For Winston, it is snakes. O'Brien fastens a cage with two snakes onto Winston's face. He releases one cage. The snakes will bore through Winston's face. He readies the release of the second cage, and Winston finally betrays his love. "Do it to Betsy!" he shouts. Winston has betrayed Betsy. He can never love her in the same way again. Winston is released and is given a nother job. He makes good money for doing something, exactly what that is, he has no idea. When the book ends he is sitting in The Hemlock Tree Cafe, He is awaiting news of a major sports game. Utopia's championship titles are now being threatened. Winston has a plan in his head of how Big Bother could outflank the enemy. When the news finally comes in, he finds that Big Bother did exactly what he was thinking. The enemy is outflanked. The championship is saved. Finally, Winston truly respects Big Bother. Winston is a middle-aged man. He is slow in his ways as are most Utopians. He was a very Dynamic character. At first he was opposed to The Party, in the end, he loved it. Betsy is a woman of 36. Very beautiful, or as beautiful as an INGSOC member can be. Her main goal in life was to do as much as she could against The Party and still stay alive. She was a major member in many Community service type organizations. O'leary is a very intelligent man. During the book he always maintained a Parent/Teacher way. When he saw that Winston was suffering, he put his hand on his shoulder to help him through it. The book is written in partly third person, and partly first. The change occurs quickly, and is not hard to follow. It helps for you to know more then the character sometimes to understand it better. There are many literary terms in such a great piece of literature. Foreshadowing is prevalent in the first few chapters. Within the first few chapters O'leary is introduced and makes a simple glance toward Winston. This makes Winston think that O'leary is a member of the Brotherhood. Winston catches Julia glancing at him. He thinks that she is a member of the Newspeak Police. There is a major piece of Symbolism when Winston buys a paper shredder. The paper shredder is rounded at the top, and flat at the bottom. Inside it is a piece of coral. This symbolizes to Winston a feeling of safety and it is to him like the little room he and Betsy rent. This could also be considered a simile when he makes the comparison. The basic theme of this novel is that if we don't watch out 1984 will find us. We need to realize when we are being intruded upon by the government just a little too much. If the government proposes a new chip to be placed into all telecommunications devices so that it can tap into them. We have to stop it. (This is not hypothetical, the government proposed "The Vestol Chip" which would be used to listen to our encoded conversations, and to see our data communications. We would be safe from our neighbors, but not from our government.) The author's predictions of the future are really advice, "Don't let the government control every aspect of your private lives." If we allow this we will be turned into robots of the system. Perhaps it is also a look at what is already. In many ways we are controlled, we are robots. In kindergarten we are taught how to be that way. "Stand in a line, don't talk, hands out of pockets, fire drill, bells ringing." We are truly controlled by words and bells. Nine-teen-eighty-four has come and gone, however that doesn't mean we are safe. The author's view of the future is no longer even close to accurate. It will NEVER happen that way. No, today we have far BETTER ways of this happening. With computers containing almost all data, which can be quickly erased in large numbers at the touch of a button, information is much easier to "rectify." With new technology we could hide microphones in the fabric of clothing. Video cameras are smaller today. They could be worn about people. Maybe in the future be implanted in them. Orwell's future is dead. The reality is that it could be even worse. Orwell should NOT be discredited, he should be listened to and praised. There are measures going through congress now that will inhibit our rights in the future. Our own congress makes measures to give themselves raises. They won't vote yes on such bills as term limits. It is not inconceivable that a bill could pass to law saying that the president and congress shall stay in power forever. They could even convince us to allow it to happen. I loved this novel. It ranks far up there on my list of the best, if not the best. Not only did it keep me reading until the end, it told very much about where we are headed by not actually saying it. It also told you things by saying it. The entire principles of INGSOC may seem absurd, and to the intelligent person impossible. However, they do have a certain air of universality. You can draw parallels to today. The way our congress and president act seems to be heading toward this type of government. It won't be exactly as Orwell put it, and it will be shaded even more. Perhaps if it does happen, it will be done right, and never end. This is what Orwell portrayed in the novel. He left the world in the exact same way we found it, minus a few people. Actually, they never existed. The sad thing is with today's technology, I see this coming closer and closer. All someone, or someone, have to do is piece it together.