O'Brien Character Analysis

The character of O'Brien is a complex one. Originally discovered as another man opposed to the Party, him and Winston meet up and discuss The Brotherhood; an underground group of people working to overthrow the Party. However, soon enough O'Brien's true nature is revealed as a Party supporter when he takes both Julia and Winston to the Ministry of Love.

The original characteristic of O'Brien that attracts Winston to him is his charisma, he seems to have an underlying quality that people enjoy. However, under the surface there is a near fanatical urge for power and control; control over those who don't see the world the same way that he does. Knowing that Orwell wrote 1984 following WWII O'Brien's character seemed to me to be a reflection of Orwell's view of Adolf Hitler, almost as much so as Big Brother seemed to be based upon Joseph Stalin. Both Hitler and O'Brien seem to be blinded by the prospect of power to the point of inhumanity; a feature discovered to be greatly admired by the Party.

O'Brien is the perfect agent of the Party. The torture and pain that O'Brien inflicts upon Winston is a direct reflection of the Party's views against a free-thinking individual. The fact that he declares that he "could float off the floor like a soap bubble"(569) by using levitation is an example of doublethink; the Party's favorite form of brainwash. He has the ability to hold two contrasting ideas within his mind at the same time and still believe them both to be true. He can read the Party's slogan "War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength" and wholeheartedly agree with it.

O'Brien is revealed to be a firm believer and user of doublethink; the ability to have two contrasting ideas in one's head and still believe them both to be true, something greatly cherished by the Party.

Being the physical manifestation of the entire Party's beliefs, when Winston argues the fact that humanity is real and that man holds a natural set of rights, O'Brien shut him down. He claims that the human spirit is non-existant, and in so, reveals the true nature of the party; to crush man until it is no longer capable of thoughts and feelings. Dehumanization. By supporting the Party O'Brien is stating that he believes that all humans should act as machines, but in doing so he is contradicting his very beliefs that no man should think for himself. Doublethink in a nutshell.

The Symbolism of The Glass Paperweight and St. Clements Church

Through the use of intense propaganda the Party forces their version of the past, and in turn their vision of truth itself, to manifest within individual minds. While controlling the present the Party are able to make it almost impossible to deny the fact that they might not have controlled the entire past as well. Throughout the novel Winston attempts to see through the haze of lies in his mind to recover his own personal memories, memories of before the Party's reign. This constant interior battle within himself soon comes to be represented in a small, glass paperweight he bought in an antique store in one of his visits to the prole district. The paperweight, clear with a pink coral interior, is one of the last remaining "chunks of history" the Party had "forgotten to alter" (319). Winston sees it as a direct spyglass to the past, a window free of the Party's influence. It is his anchor to the world before the Party, with it he is certain of the lies being spread. However, when his and Julia's room above Mr. Charrington's shop is raided by the Thought Police it is destroyed; a textbook example of foreshadowing.

The raid by the Thought Police also brings about another bout of foreshadowing; the police discover Winston and Julia from hidden the telescreen behind the painting of the St. Clements Church. Periodically, Winston had been remembering a phrase or two from an old song from his childhood, based upon the St. Clements Church. Up until this point in the novel the song, much like the paperweight, had been a symbol of hope for Winston. It also formed a direct link to a better time. However, as the police ultimately use it to destroy him, a dark shadow is cast upon it.

The paperweight shattering and the song being dirtied by the likes of the Thought Police could both be seen as direct symbolic foreshadowing of the suffering Winston and Julia alike were about to undergo. Before shattering their entire belief systems, the Party, unknowingly or not, shatter the only physical ties to the previous world that Winston could remember. Without them, Winston was left with just his fleeting memories, memories that proved able to be broken with about the same effort involved needed for smashing a glass sphere. "Here comes the chopper to chop off your head"...

Are we Proles?

One of the most interesting aspects of George Orwell's 1984 in my opinion is the role of the Proles, the everyday people at the bottom of the social class as depicted in the image below:

Spearheading the camaraderie, if I may use the term popularized by the figure head himself, is Big Brother. As the leader of the entire society, Big Brother is at the top of the social food-chain; a single figure running the lives of what is assumed to be hundreds of thousands of other people. Next up is the Inner and Outer Party, the rewarded servants of Big Brother who spend day in and day out carrying out his every command. Then, there are the Proles, the vast majority of the population. Why are they significant to Oceania's society?

Functioning as a single character, the Proles are extremely under-developed. Not once is a Prole singled out as an individual with thoughts or goals, they are an unacknowledged, mindless mass in the grand scheme of things. If this is so, however, why is it that Winston has such a livid envy for them? Why is it that they are seen as "The only free human beings" by Winston?

The answer would be subjective to the reader. As ignorant, ill-educated workers, the Proles are left in the dark about much of the secrecy and sinister activity around them; they know little of the horrors committed daily by their social superiors and they are only concerned with their very, very small world. However, ignorance truly is bliss as it seems because the Proles are happy; something Winston strives for. Being a member of the Outer-Party himself, Winston is subjected to intense scrutiny and constant stress. He is always being watched, always being judged, and most importantly, always being forced to pretend to be someone he's not. He envies the Proles because he sees them as holding the real power, and as he states "If there was hope, it lay in the proles. You had to cling on to that." (108).

How is it that ignorant, primitive, lowly beings can invoke hope in a member of the top 15% of the entire society? Simple. With large numbers lies safety as well as power. Without living in constant fear of being vaporized, the proles are allowed to feel happy and free, and with a little motivation, the proles could easily over-come their oppressive government in one massive organized surge. However, as Winston explains, they just don't know how. They are brain-washed into believing in their own freedom, they have absolutely no idea just how controlled their environment is. They have no idea of the strings tying them to the puppeteer that is Big Brother, and as a result, have no desire what so ever of an insurgence.

As a member of the social majority of our population today, this particular situation struck a chord deep within myself. Who's to say that we are not living in a prole-like society today, completely unaware of the atrocities committed around us everyday? Who's to say that our lives aren't being oppressed by our mental superiors right now? Am I living the pointless life of a prole? Are you? And if so, I wonder if it is time for our collective intelligence to strike against out against our oppressors - whoever they might be.

Winston Smith: Character Analysis

The protagonist of 1984 is Winston Smith. Winston is the character that I found easiest to relate to, and i'm sure most people would. It is through Winston's point of view that the reader peers at the world created by Orwell, and it is through the character development of Winston that Orwell conveys his fears and warnings about a totalitarian society.

Right from the start Winston is portrayed as a seemingly ordinary man out of place in an extraordinary world. Even the contrast in his identity, his first and last name, provide a sense of duality; the commonplace surname Smith versus the implied heroicity of the name Winston, a name forever cemented to Churchill. As a reader I could not help but to identify parts of myself within him, he is ordinary in almost every sense of the word, yet he finds the courage and strength to attempt to improve his circumstances. He is the underdog struggling against the favored champion; the David to Big Brother's Goliath.

In a world where simply writing in a diary is reason for an execution, Winston's life is a miserable one excluding a brief interval of happiness and love in which the reader, as well as the character, are infused with a sense of hope for the end. However, Orwell makes certain that the false hope is soon diminished as such a society could not permit a happy ending. Winston is a representation of the emotions of human beings as a whole, and in order for Orwell's true vision of a totalitarian society to be portrayed Winston must be defeated; representing the defeat every person who had identified with him would most certainly face if such a society were ever allowed to come to fruition.

Winston's spirit and humanitarianism are in the end broken, the two characteristics of himself in which he fought the hardest to keep. By using such an identifiable character Orwell is insisting that Winston's fate could occur to anyone, the very reason the author must break his protagonist. Through Winston Smith's destruction comes the realization and explicit warning that none may survive a society like that in 1984, Orwell's intended communiqué.

The Life and Times of George Orwell

Before accepting the task of reading George Orwell's 1984 I found this particular quote bouncing around in my mind:

"He who learns but does not think, is lost! He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger." - Confucious

Naturally, I interpreted this as a sign to clean up my act and actually do some research before jumping into something I wasn't prepared for. With "He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger" looming above myself I realized that the best way for me to really engage myself in the novel, and at the same time apparently protect myself from a dangerous situation, would be to acquaint myself with the author, and maybe uncover some possible influences his experiences had upon his writing of 1984.

Born Eric Arthur Blair in 1903, "George Orwell" was brought up by his mother and three sisters, seeing his father only once in his life before he turned nine years old. As a young child Mr. Orwell befriended Jacintha Buddicorn, a local girl of about the same age one day in a field. Mr. Orwell had been standing on his head, and when inquired as to why he was doing that, he replied "You are noticed more if you stand on your head, than if you are right side up". Together he and his new friend dreamed of becoming famous writers; he even went as far as to say that one day he hoped to write a novel like H.G. Wells' A Modern Utopia. Later in his life, after years spent honing his writing skills; Orwell worked as a policeman in Burma for about five years before becoming ill and being forced to return to his home in England. It is no secret that while he may have behaved like a British officer was expected to at the time, he was not that person mentally.

"While in Burma, he acquired a moustache similar to those worn by officers of the British regiments stationed there. [He] also acquired some tattoos; on each knuckle he had a small untidy blue circle. Many Burmese living in rural areas still sport tattoos like this - they are believed to protect against bullets and snake bites."

- Emma Larkin, Introduction, Burmese Days, Penguin Classics edition, 2009

During this time Orwell also wrote his first novel, Burmese Days.

After years of moving around, from Paris to London and even to his parents' home in Southwold, England Orwell soon became a public figure withhis post WWII novel Animal Farm (1945). Following his newfound recognition some say Orwell literally worked himself to death, he spent four of his last five years mixing both journalistic work for various newspapers and magazines with his own writing... writing that would soon be finished and published in 1949. It was titled 1984. A year later on January 21st, 1950 George Orwell passed away at the University College Hospital. He would be buried beneath the words "Here lies Eric Arthur Blair", an overly-modest hedge stone for such an extraordinary writer.

Abolished, Annhilated: Vaporized...

"People simply disappeared, always during the night. Your name was removed from the registers, every record of everything you had ever done was wiped out, your one-time existence was denied and then forgotten. You were abolished, annihilated: vaporized was the usual word."
- George Orwell, 1984, Book 1, Chapter 1

Welcome to George Orwell's 1984, one of his most famous and enduring pieces of work. Translated into over 60 languages and even a feature film, 1984 is seen as a very iconic novel. The repercussions of this novel are still being felt today; political and social paranoia created by the "Big Brother" factor can't help but impede on our daily thoughts. However, is it truly a Classic novel? In this blog I will be exploring and analysing this seemingly timeless novel, as well as posting my opinion on whether or not I agree with giving it the status as a "Classic Novel" or not.