Someone was always watching. This controversial topic emerged with CCTV and surveillance, which George Orwell predicted in his classic novel 1984. The “Party” rules in an authoritarian society and had the ability to watch their population whenever they wished. O’Brien, a member of the privileged inner party, was a man with an ominous profession, one that even the protagonist of 1984, Winston, was not aware of. Winston learned of O’Brien’s true work the hard way: O’Brien was watching Winston for seven years, waiting to finally expose and punish Winston for his rebellion towards the party. O’Brien did this by gaining the trust of both Winston and his partner in crime, Julia, and betrayed the bond they had created. O’Brien portrayed himself as …show more content…
In particular, his ability to coax and ease Winston and Julia only to then take advantage of their relaxed nature and expose their opposition to the party. O’Brien, as a major character, made many appearances and engaged with both Winston and Julia in a positive manner for the majority of the book. Winston himself had come to trust O’Brien greatly as seen through his thought of: “Winston should believe O’Brien to be trustworthy on the strength of a single ash of the eyes.” (Orwell 152), displaying his trust in O’Brien. O’Brien continued to gain Winston and Julia’s trust by posing as an opponent to the Party himself. O’Brien acts as a member of the Brotherhood, an underground organization that opposed the party and desired to dismantle their rule. Little did Winston and Julia know that the Brotherhood was an imaginary entity created by the Inner Party to lure rebels into a false sense of safety and support. This nonexistent organization was crafted in a manner that made it appear real. O’Brien even went to such an extent that he, along with other Inner Party members, wrote a manual for the Brotherhood, increasing its perceived authenticity and to make the legend of the Brotherhood a much more believable one. O’Brien says: “‘I wrote it. That is to say, I collaborated in writing it. No book is produced individually, as you know.’” (Orwell 261). This demonstrates O’Brien’s sheer intelligence and how skilled he is in maintaining his round personality; being able to perfectly pose as a rebel in order to serve the
— that O’Brien was thinking the same thing as himself” (Orwell 18). They both knew the consequences. Significant Quotes Reflection Connection Entry 9: Book 2, Chapter 8; 138-147 Summary Significant Quotes Reflection Connection. Entry 10: Book 2, Chapter 9; 148-179 Summary Significant Quotes Reflection Connection.
O'Brien - The protagonist Winston Smith, living in a dystopian society governed by the Party, feels strangely attracted to Inner Party member O'Brien. Winston suspects that O'Brien is secretly opposing the Party. Eventually O'Brien approaches Winston with some leading remarks which seem to confirm Winston's suspicions. Winston finds the courage to approach him and openly declares himself an enemy of the totalitarian state. Winston's intuition seems to be correct: O'Brien presents himself as a member of the "Brotherhood" seeking to overthrow the Party.
However, within Orwell's nightmare of the future, he ironically foresees trust as the enemy of both government and society. Winston instantly trusts O'Brien because he most likely holds "a secretly held belief" (11) similar to himself. Moreover, a situationally ironic example surfaces when the familiar voice of Mr. Charrington sings before they are caught, "Here comes a candle to light you to bed, here comes a chopper to chop off your head!" (222). Yet another situationally ironic example emerges when Winston gives in to O’Brien and his method of torture screaming, “Do it to Julia! Do it to Julia! Not me! I don’t care what you do to her. Tear her face off, strip her to the bones. Not me!” (286). At the conclusion of the book Winston displays his true, brainwashed colors when he admits “He loved Big Brother” (298). Throughout the book, Orwell uses irony to communicate trusting people in a hopeless future alters someone mentally and
In the middle of the novel, O’Brien appears as the escape from Big Brother, providing both Winston and Julia with information pertaining to the Brotherhood. Unfortunately for these two lovers, it is all façade. O’Brien is merely trying to find out what their limits and breaking points are. After asking Winston and Julia a set of questions, O’Brien asks the ultimate question, “You are prepared, the two of you, to separate and never see one another again” (180), to which Julia replies, “No” (180). This exchange of words gives O’Brien the upper hand for later events. He now knows that the love shared between Winston and Julia is not solely an act of rebellion, but also that it is what will get the two characters to conform and accept Big Brother. This finally gives O’Brien the opportunity to change Winston; something that he has been willing to do for some time now. O’Brien states, “For seven years, I have watched over you. Now, the turning-point has come” (256). Prior to Winston’s relationship, O’Brien had nothing to hold over Winston if he was to get Winston to conform, and was waiting for the opportune moment to do so. However, he is now able to manipulate Winston’s love for Julia, and turn it towards love for Big Brother. He uses their love as leverage while torturing Winston. O’Brien also
As Winston Smith comes to the last of his punishment he is put into room 101. This is a room of extreme punishment the punishment through your biggest fear. Know as “the worst thing in the world.” Winston gets his worst fear, rats, right in front of him and cracks, he loses the one thing he still loves that now is taken away from him, Julia. This ending is not happy and nothing you would wish on the life of Winston. Yet is there optimism? To some extent there is.
loss, it's to do with futility. For all he did, for all the rules he
Everyone craves rebellion at some point. It may not even be because they oppose something strongly, it may just be because they want a rush and the feeling that they are defying a cause larger than themselves. In the book 1948 by George Orwell, Winston Smith does not only just crave the feeling of defying the invasive Party and Big Brother, but he has a strong hate towards the form of government that is ruling over him. Big Brother is an overlooking force in Oceania that monitors every aspect of society. Winston works in The Ministry of Truth, where he alters history. Instead of sitting back and accepting The Party like his fellow members of Oceania, Winston makes the audacious move to rebel. Winston faces a struggle
Firstly, O’Brien, a member of the inner party, uses technology to accomplish complete control over the public through the means of telescreens, hidden microphones and torture machines, ‘Any sound that Winston made… could be picked up by [the telescreen]. [Winston] could be seen as well as heard’. This emphasises to the reader the extent of control that the party can exercise over the public, enabling them to eliminate any potential rebels. Furthermore, this loss of freedom and individuality exterminates any real friendship, family or love forcing the public to turn to Big Brother for companionship. This in turn minimises the chance of rebellion as everyone views Big Brother as a figure of comfort and security, ‘As he seemed to tower up, an invincible, fearless protector…’ O’Brien also uses a torture machine on Winston, ‘[He] had never loved [O’Brien] so deeply as at this moment’. This machine enables O’Brien to manipulate Winston’s views, personal opinions and even feelings. O’Brien is able to make Winston view the world as he wants him to, even to the extent of making Winston love him, his tormentor, the person inflicting the pain. ...
O’Brien tortures Winston due to his acts of thoughtcrime, Winston is told that the Party will be satisfied with nothing less than Winston completely giving in. O’Brien explains, “We are not content with negative obedience, nor even with the most abject submission. When finally you surrender to us, it must be of your own free will. We do not destroy the heretic because he resists us; so long as he resists us we never destroy him” (210). Winston is tortured for the goal of eradicating the cause of Winston’s fight, to consider himself happy and free. O’Brien wants to destroy any possibility of Winston becoming a martyr for his cause. The use of the telescreens, microphones, and all other sources of the government spying on its people ensures a lack of freedom: “Asleep or awake, working or eating, indoors or out of doors, in the bath or in bed- no escape. Nothing was your own except the few cubic centimeters inside your skull” (26). The members of this society are monitored at all times for the sole purpose of government control, with constant monitoring they are able to discover the most they can about individuals and later use it against them to gain an upper hand in controlling any possible uprising. Fear is used as another tactic to gain control. Winston is aware of the fact that “More
Throughout the passage, Orwell displays the fear of being judged through the character O’Brian. When Winston makes eye contact with O’Brian, “O’Brian seemed to be saying […] ‘I am on your side!’” (Orwell paragraph 8) and then his face became “inscrutable as everybody else’s.” (Orwell paragraph 8). This shows that although O’Brian had a different opinion just like Winston he changed his facial expression quickly to fit in with the rest. He felt that if he had said done something against the protesters, he would be attacked. This happens a lot in society, people hide their emotions because they do not know how others will react to their opinion.
Both are taken into custody and tortured and beaten so that they can be rebuilt to obey the Party and to sell out each other. Winston takes many days of torture and pain before he is put into room 101 where he is encountered with his worst fear,which is rats. Winston the breaks down and yells, “Do it to Julia! Do it to Julia! Not me! I don’t care what you do to her. Tear her face off, strip her to the bones. Not me! Julia! Not me” (Orwell 286). The only thing that kept Winston going was the fact that he hadn’t yet betrayed Julia, and he felt determined to never betray her. With Julia, O’Brien told Winston that she gave him away almost instantly. She was all about saving herself,and did not care about what could happen to Winston now that they were caught and their relationship would not continue.
George Orwell creates a dark, depressing and pessimistic world where the government has full control over the masses in the novel 1984. The protagonist, Winston, is low-level Party member who has grown to resent the society that he lives in. Orwell portrays him as a individual that begins to lose his sanity due to the constrictions of society. There are only two possible outcomes, either he becomes more effectively assimilated or he brings about the change he desires. Winston starts a journey towards his own self-destruction. His first defiant act is the diary where he writes “DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER.” But he goes further by having an affair with Julia, another party member, renting a room over Mr. Carrington’s antique shop where Winston conducts this affair with Julia, and by following O’Brien who claims to have connections with the Brotherhood, the anti-Party movement led my Emmanuel Goldstein. Winston and Julia are both eventually arrested by the Thought Police when Mr. Carrington turns out to be a undercover officer. They both eventually betray each other when O’Brien conducts torture upon them at the Ministry of Love. Orwell conveys the limitations of the individual when it comes to doing something monumental like overthrowing the established hierarchy which is seen through the futility of Winston Smith’s actions that end with his failure instead of the end of Big Brother. Winston’s goal of liberating himself turns out to be hopeless when the people he trusted end up betraying him and how he was arbitrarily manipulated. It can be perceived that Winston was in fact concerned more about his own sanity and physical well-being because he gives into Big Brother after he is tortured and becomes content to live in the society he hated so much. Winston witnesses the weakness within the prole community because of their inability to understand the Party’s workings but he himself embodies weakness by sabotaging himself by associating with all the wrong people and by simply falling into the arms of Big Brother. Orwell created a world where there is no use but to assimilate from Winston’s perspective making his struggle utterly hopeless.
Every person has their own motivations, or in other words, their own reasons for their desires, actions, and needs. People such as serial killers are often motivated to commit their crimes by the desire to hurt people, which often can be traced back to a rough childhood. On the other hand there’s people such as doctors and lawyers who came from similar circumstances; yet they were motivated by a desire to escape their past, particularly through the means of success. However often, we might not even know the motivation behind our own actions, which hinders our self control. Perhaps this is why people often make rash decisions. This can be seen in the case of Winston Smith in the novel 1984 by George Orwell. Throughout the book Winston continually
At this moment, Winston feels powerless against the seemingly unstoppable Party, knowing that his life is at the mercy of O’Brien. Thus, Winston’s already weak willpower continues to wither away, rendering him more vulnerable to further reformation. The final procedure in completely transforming Winston’s personality occurs in the dreaded Room 101. To achieve his ultimate goal of breaking Winston’s loyalty towards Julia, O’Brien exploits Winston’s deepest fear of rats in a rather gruesome manner.
“I always feel like somebody's watching me and I have no privacy.” These are the famous lyrics from one of Michael Jackson's hit songs Somebody’s Watching Me. Now, back when this song was created, there was not as much worry about people constantly being watched by cameras, but it seems to fit in the problem that my generation is facing. In the book 1984, written by George Orwell, the society is always being watched through a device called a telescreen. The main character, Winston, has trouble adjusting to the life of always being monitored, and the fact that if you made one mistake you could be tortured or killed. This book was made in the late 1940’s and was written to show what the predicted future would be like. Many people who have read