Notes on Nineteen Eighty-Four

By grif, Student

Brief notes and key quotes on character, setting and context in Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four

An essay hosted at LiteratureClassics.com

Nineteen Eighty-Four Context

Stalinist Russia and National Soviet Germany à Totalitarian Rule

Stalinist Russia
à Destruction of Records (Ministry of Truth)
à Beautification of Leader

Closer to Home – England
à Very poor working conditions explored in The Road to Wigan Pier compared to the proletarians “If there’s any hope, it lies in the proles”

Restrictions Placed on the Individual
à Thoughtcrime (to think a crime is to commit a crime) - successfully indoctrinated:

“Thoughtcrime is death”


à Telescreens - Dual function (surveillance and propaganda). Symbol of the totalitarian hegemony.

Propaganda
· mould positive public opinion of the war, which is a ploy to burn resources and keep everyone in a state of near-poverty as well as incite patriotism for Big Brother:

“I’m authorized to say that this victory brings the war within measurable distance of its end.”

· Juxtapose good news with bad news
· Declare false production statistics
· Promote newspeak

Surveillance

“How often, or in what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time.”


à Newspeak (eradication of revolutionary words, behaviour; conforming to basic
necessary pro-party speech)

à Two Minutes Hate

“a desire to kill, to torture, to smash faces in with a sledge hammer”

Example of the influence of totalitarian tools used to dominate citizens of Oceania is in Parsons, who is actually proud of his daughter for reporting him to the Thought Police:

“I don’t bear her any grudge for it. In fact I’m proud of her. It shows I brought her up in the right spirit, anyway.”







Nineteen Eighty-Four Setting

In a totalitarian society in which the individual is suppressed, every element of his environment must be controlled by an absolute authority. In Oceania, the Party’s control over its people is highlighted by Orwell’s use of the setting.


Historical Setting
· Set in the future - part of Orwell’s plan to shock readers into realizing the potential for such totalitarian systems to develop in their own lifetime.
· Set in a fictional world which allows Orwell scope to make it as shocking and horrific place as possible.
· Based on Stalinist Russia, National Soviet Germany and Socialist England.

Place
· Airstrip One, Oceania.
· All elements above (telescreens, etc.)
· Introduction to the setting in the exposition during which Winston travels from work to his apartment:
o Depressing gloomy buildings, dingy apartments
“There seemed to be no colour in anything”
o Cold, “vile wind”, “swirl of gritty dust”
o Smell of “boiled cabbage and old rag mats”

Time
· Time of day seems to have little effect – the dark, gloomy, colourless atmosphere perpetuates the novel and its characters continually.









Character Briefs


Winston – the only person who questions the ideologies of the party; tries to determine whether it had always been controlled by Big Brother.

“He tried to squeeze out some childhood memory that should tell him whether London had always been like this.”

Julia – sees the party’s totalitarian rule as permanent hindrances in her life which just need to be avoided. Doesn’t question ideologies.

“accepting the Party as something unalterable, like the sky, not rebelling against its authority but simply evading it, as a rabbit dodges a dog.”