In totalitarian societies there will always be the rebels and the heretics. The entire dystopian genre is founded on the idea that a handful of people will persevere through pain and torture to usurp an oppressive government. Unfortunately, the reality is that a person cannot be brave in the face of pain. George Orwell’s 1984 shatters the illusion of bravado through the transformation of Winston as his personality is stripped apart. Winston’s transformation into the perfect Oceanian citizen is divided into learning, understanding and acceptance.
The first portion of Winston’s transformation in the Ministry of Love is learning. He is first beaten repeatedly, and mercilessly by the hands of the guards prior to his “learning” session with
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There are three specific methods that O’Brien uses for Winston’s understanding to occur. The first method O’Brien uses is physical torture-- specifically electrocution, to force Winston to obey his demands, "‘remember throughout our conversation, that I have it in my power to inflict pain on you at any moment and to whatever degree I choose?’" (3.2.30-108). O’Brien's first use of physical torture is to initially force Winston into submission. Once Winston demonstrates that he is listening, O’Brien electrocutes him less frequently, and puts on a parental/mentor-like mask. As Winston becomes more complacent, O’Brien switches to psychological manipulation. At this point Winston’s personality is slowly breaking, and he begins to "understand" what it is to be citizen of Oceania: "His mind contained Winston’s mind. But in that case how could it be true that O’Brien was mad? It must be he, Winston, who was mad. … ‘Do not imagine that you will save yourself, Winston’" (3.2.46-108). All of O’Brien’s manipulation impacts Winston psychologically, as he begins to doubt himself, and believe that O’Brien may actually be the sane one. Finally, O’Brien succeeds in completely shattering Winston by taking him to room 101, "‘for everyone there is something unendurable… Courage and cowardice are not involved. …rats. For you, they are unendurable… a form of pressure that you cannot withstand’" (3.5.88-108). He slowly …show more content…
Winston becomes complacent and submissive, “[gin] had become the element he swam in. …No one cared what he did any longer, … Occasionally, … he went… and did a little work, or what was called work” (3.6.101, 102-108). He lives apathetically— a shell of what he once was. He is kept complacent with all the gin that he is served every day, he no longer questions facts fed to him by the Party, like the good citizen he is. Winston is unable to focus on one task or think in a complex manner like he could prior to his torture, “he could never fix his mind on any one subject for more than a few moments at a time” (3.6.93-108). Intelligence, or long strands of cohesive thoughts in Oceania are dangerous to the Party. Since Winston cannot think like before, he also can no longer pick up fallacies in the Party’s information, not that he tries to anymore either. Winston finally experiences true love and loyalty for Big Brother: “the struggle was finished… He loved Big Brother” (3.6.107-108). A citizen that loves Big Brother is a citizen that will never rebel. Love for Big Brother is the final piece that Winston needs to become the perfect Party member, now that he possesses it, he devolves into the perfect
Winston commits “thoughtcrime” leading to his arrest and questioning at the Ministry of Love, the communities jail center working with matters pertaining to war. His comrade O’Brien begins torturing him in an underground room and calls it the “learning stage”. He teaches Winston the truth about the Party and their slogan; eventually he explains that “Freedom is Slavery” is easily reversed as “Slavery is freedom. Alone- free- the human being is always defeated… if he can make complete, utter submission… [and] merge himself in the Party… then he is all-powerful and immortal” (264). The Party uses this statement to illustrate that when one acknowledges the collective will, they become free from danger and desire. Those who are surrendered to INGSOC, including O’Brien, assume that when an individual has freedom they become subjugated to their senses and emotions. Moreover, Winston continues to be starved and tortured until he appears to be nothing but skin and bones when his opinions transition to align with the governments. He now accepts everything that O’Brien has expressed to him including that he is crazy and two plus two equals five. While he thinks about what he has been taught he thinks about “How easy it all was! Only surrender, and everything else followed… he hardly knew why he had ever rebelled” (278). In a sense, Winston is now free, only in a
Readers often find themselves constantly drawn back to the topic of George Orwell’s 1984 as it follows a dystopian community which is set in a world that has been in continuous war, has no privacy by means of surveillance and has complete mind control and is known by the name of Oceania. The story follows a man by the name of Winston who possesses the features of “A smallish, frail figure… his hair very fair, his face naturally sanguine [and] his skin roughened” (Orwell 2). The novel illustrates to readers what it would be like if under complete control of the government. As a result, this book poses a couple of motifs’, For instance part one tackles “Collectivism” which means the government controls you, while part two fights with “Romance” with Winston and Julia’s sexual tension as well the alteration of love in the community, and part three struggles with “Fear” and how it can control someone physically and mentally.
“He has finally learned to love big brother” was how George Orwell in his novel 1984 described Winston, conversion to the party are represented by big brother at the end of the novel. It is easy to believe that at this instance, after torturous reeducation that Winston has endured, he has lost free will and no longer be able to freely choose to love big brother but was forced to, against hiss will. Therefore Winston was never free to love big brother, and in fact not free at all after his “reeducation.” But if we are to accept a definition of free will that stipulates that we are able to produce and act on our own volitions we must accept that Winston has retained and has chosen to love big brother out of his own free will.
According to the government of Oceania, most acts Winston engages in represent signs of rebellion. For example, within the first few pages of the novel, Winston wrote down the words “DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER” several times in his journal (Orwell 16). “Big Brother” stands as the leader of the Party who supposedly watches over everybody. When Winston writes down the phrase “down with big brother,” he participates in ThoughtCrime. Committing ThoughtCrime requires having thoughts displaying hate or defiance towards the Party. Participating in ThoughtCrime always leads to death, so someone had seen Winston’s journal, then he would immediately go The Ministry of Love, a place of torture, horror, and death. Furthermore, Winston also rebels against the party by becoming lovers with Julia and secretly meeting up with her multiple times. In this society, no two people can love, show affection, or have pleasurable sex without major consequences. Winston breaks both of these rules with Julia because he loves destroying the “pureness”and “virtue” of the Party. He strives for corruption, and says he will do “anything to rot, weaken, [and] to undermine” the Party (Orwell 111). He enjoys “the animal instinct, the simple undifferentiated desire,” and thinks the force of desire he feels will “tear the Party to pieces” (Orwell 111). Due to his beliefs, he repeats his actions over and
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
George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984 follows the psychological journey of main character Winston. Winston lives in a utopian society called Oceania. There, the citizens are constantly monitored by their government coined “Big Brother” or “The Party”. In Oceania, there is no form of individuality or privacy. Citizens are also coerced to believe everything and anything the government tells them, even if it contradicts reality and memory. The goal of Big Brother is to destroy individual loyalties and make its citizenry only loyal to the government. In Orwell's novel 1984, he uses Winston's psychological journey to stress the dangers of individuality in a totalitarian regime because it can result in death. Winston’s overwhelming desire to rebel
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.
Winston is arrested and taken to The Ministry of Love, another of the main government agencies. Here he is tortured physically by starvation and electrocution under the watch of The Party. He is manipulated physiologically by being conditioned to avoid torture by answering questions about his loyalty to The Party.
The first idea that is consistently shown in this novel that supports theme is torture. In the last part of the book especially torture is used to break Winston down until he is nothing but skin and bone. “They slapped his face, wrung his ears, pulled his hair, made him stand on one leg, refused him leave to urinate, shone glaring lights in his face until his eyes ran with water; but the aim of this was simply to humiliate him and destroy his power of arguing and reasoning.” (Orwell 241) Torture
Through months of torture and debilitating pressure, he was stripped of his individualism and was taught to love big brother (McLaughlin). The pressures of society mixed with the strenuous hours of daily torture took a toll on his weakened brain. This was most evident when O’Brien asked him one last time if he loved Big Brother, and he answered yes. He did not say yes in order to end the torture, rather he said yes because his brain was rendered incapable of independent thought. Orwell does this to show his readers that self expression and independent thought are what ultimately make us human. Without those two things, we are left to live in an impressionistic society, one that urges us to like and believe in certain things- similar to that of Oceania. O’Brien torturing Winston was more than just the climax of the book; it was the solution to Orwell’s underlying question: Can the traits that make us human prevail in the face of turmoil and despair? "You had to live—did live, from habit that became instinct—in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every moment scrutinized” (Orwell 3).The fact that this statement made in the beginning holds true by the end of the novel answers the question that no; humanity would not
...he views of the Party. "Do it to Julia! Do it to Julia! Not me! Julia! I don't care what you do to her. Tear her face off, strip her to the bones. Not me! Julia! Not me!" (Part 3, Chapter 5). Winston’s mind is considered cured the moment that he turns on the one person her truly loves.
In 1984, Winston’s torture had a purpose of brainwashing, where the themes of control is explored and alienation is hinted and introduced in his interrogations with O’Brien and his time in room one-oh-one. Firstly, Winston is imprisoned in Miniluv (Ministry of Love) for his rebellious sexual activity with Julia, and the reader will assume that this is repression of opposition by the government. But once O’Brien is revealed to be Winston’s interrogator, it is clearly established that the purpose of this torture has never been repression, but rather controlling the thoughts of the few individuals that were “insane”(253) enough to rebel against government. O’Brien described this procedure as curing, as he also describes Winston as insane, and made it distinctively clear to Winston that his goal was not to punish or indulge “in the overact”(253) but rather the thought. While the goal is instead of destroying our enemies, “we change them.”(253) In this stern explanation from O’Brien, the...
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.
George Orwell uses Winston to represent truth in a deceptive world in his novel 1984. In Oceania, Big Brother is the omnipotent and all powerful leader. Everything the government dictates is unquestionably true, regardless of prior knowledge. Even thinking of ideas that go against Big Brother’s regime, or thoughtcrime, is punishable by death. Winston serves as the dystopian hero, longing for freedom and change. Orwell uses Winston to emphasize the importance of individual freedoms, as they give us the ability to fulfillingly lead our respective lives.