1984 Winston's Downfall

Many works of literature have the main character’s downfall caused by one of their main traits. In 1984 by George Orwell the main character, Winston, displays envy many times throughout the novel. From the first chapter when he starts to rebel against the Party in small ways to the middle and end of the book when he says he will do anything to destroy the Party. Winston’s envy leads to many good things for him, such as finding Mr. Charrington’s shop and meeting Julia, however it also leads to his downfall. In the beginning of the book Winston is writing in a diary. An act which may seem small but which is a unquestionably large crime in the book. From this moment the reader can tell that Winston is envious of life before the Party from what

He started skipping nights at the Community Center, an unusual act, and starts going to Mr. Charrington’s shop, an extremely dangerous act. Winston then takes even larger risks such as buying a piece of glass with coral in it from Mr. Charrington. Since the Party considers items like the coral useless and believes people shouldn’t own useless items Winston would be severely punished if he is caught. He also goes up to a prole in a bar and starts asking about what was like before the Party took control. The whole time he is doing this he realizes that it is dangerous and the book says, “It was a queer thing, even a compromising thing, for a Party member to have in his possession,” while Winston was describing the coral. His ideals are also shown to be very different from the Party’s ideals when Winston says, “The thing was doubly attractive because of its apparent uselessness.” The Party doesn’t see the point in owning useless things and they want everyone to think the same was as

Winston believed that O’Brien also hates the Party and envied life before the Party existed. Under this impression Winston went to O’Brien’s house with Julia and they were told that the Brotherhood existed and that they could join. Despite being told that they couldn’t see each other again, wouldn’t know much about the Brotherhood, and may have to do horrible things they agreed to join. O’Brien then had them do more things when they left. The major thing was that one day he let Winston get a copy of Goldstein’s book. Winston read through a lot of the book and that was the final act which showed O’Brien just how much he envied life before the