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Book Review – 1984, by George Orwell

George Orwell’s 1984 is a grim read that tells of a future in which something has gone horribly wrong in society resulting the extreme oppression of the citizens of at least one super state. It might be most famous for exploring the idea of technological mass surveillance but at its core it is a book about power.

To best understand the book it helps to understand a little about the circumstances in which it was written. Released in 1949 it was written during the immediate aftermath of WWII as the Iron Curtain descended over Eastern Europe and Stalin tightened his grip on power. It was also a time when communism was spreading globally, particularly in Asia. The threat of global war was renewed however this time with the prospect of nuclear weapons.

This was also a time when the old European empires were in rapid retreat, the seat of Western power had shifted to the USA and Britain had yet to develop its own nuclear weapons. Britain was also struggling to recover from WWII economically.

George Orwell himself was a disillusioned socialist. Deeply committed to socialist economics but strongly opposed to communism and its totalitarian tendencies, especially Soviet style communism under Stalin.

The effect of all these personal (Orwell), national (Britain) and global anxieties are reflected in the story. However, while socialist revolutions were the vehicle used to explain how the political structure of 1984 emerged, the central themes of the story would still work if a different ideology was used, i.e extreme oligarchical capitalism. It is a book about political power crushing the lives of individuals so all that is required is a mechanism to concentrate extreme political power in the hands of a few at the expense of an increasingly disempowered general population. What matters is the relentless accumulation of power for power’s own sake.

1984 is told from the perspective of Winston Smith, a low-level party member who works in the “Ministry of Truth”. Winston’s world is one in which there is no objective truth, only party approved “facts.” The classic example of which is requiring citizens to believe “2 + 2 = 5” despite knowing it being demonstrably false. 1984 explores the throne of lies upon which totalitarian oppression sits. In the party’s view, every “fact” is malleable, one of several possible truths. Which one is true at any one time depends upon which best suites the purposes of the party.

The best example of this is the global war that has been running for decades between the three super states that exist in 1984. At any one time Winston’s nation is at war with one and allied with the other. Winston observes that every few years the allegiances suddenly switch for no apparent reason but the official history is that the allegiances have never varied. Winston begins to doubt the war’s existence and since it is never directly observed by the reader, he might be correct. He begins to suspect that the war might simply be another party tool to maintain social unity. United against a common enemy.

“War is Peace”

The threat of a global war against two rival super states over time enables the party to force the citizenry to tolerate ever more pervasive attacks on their individual freedoms in support of the war effort. To do otherwise risks losing the war and being enslaved by foreign invaders. Only total loyalty to the party can avert this fate.

“Freedom is Slavery”

This leads to doubts about the very nature of Winston’s world beyond Airstrip 1 (formerly the United Kingdom). No other parts of the world are directly observed or objectively documented as foreign trade and travel do not exist in 1984. It is possible that only the United Kingdom has succumbed to such brutal totalitarianism and now exists as an isolated hermit state. Or the world could be exactly as described by the party. The point is that Winston (and by extension the reader) have no way of knowing. Objective truth is buried.

“Ignorance is Strength”

The true horror and genius of 1984 isn’t the mass technological surveillance. Rather it is as a cautionary tale (rather than a discrete prophecy) showing glimpses of a disfigured, tortured, grotesque society that exists in our near future and is a clear descendent of our own. One in which technology is exploited to the detriment rather than the benefit of humanity.

This is a story about totalitarianism and the disturbingly simple but powerful ways to gradually and increasingly enslave an entire population, which is why it remains relevant. The party’s methods are written right there above the front entrance to the Ministry of Truth:

“War is Peace

Freedom is Slavery

Ignorance is Strength”

About the author: Chris is an Associate Editor at Grounded Curiosity and a currently serving Australian Army officer. Building on a multi-discipline engineering background, his passion is technological development and PME. Chris’ work has previously appeared on Grounded Curiosity, Strategy Bridge and The Cove. Find him on Twitter .

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Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell

Author: George Orwell

Publisher: Secker & Warburg

Genre: Dystopian, Science Fiction, Satire

First Publication: 1949

Language: English

Major Characters: Winston Smith, Big Brother, O’Brien, Emmanuel Goldstein, Tom Parsons, Syme, Julia

Theme: Totalitarianism and Communism, The Individual vs. Collective Identity, Reality Control, Class Struggle,

Setting: London in the year 1984

Narrator: Third-person omniscient

Book Summary: Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell

1984: A Novel, unleashes a unique plot as per which No One is Safe or Free. No place is safe to run or even hide from a dominating party leader, Big Brother, who is considered equal to God. This is a situation where everything is owned by the State. The world was seeing the ruins of World War II. Leaders such as Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini prevailed during this phase. Big Brother is always watching your actions. He even controls everyone’s feelings of love, to live and to discover. The basic plot of this historic novel revolves around the concept that no person has freedom to live life on his or her own terms. The present day is 1984.

The whole world is gradually changing. The nations which enjoy freedom, have distorted into unpleasant and degraded places, in turn creating a powerful cartel known as Oceania. This is the world where the Big Brother controls everything. There is another character Winston Smith, who is leading a normal layman life under these harsh circumstances, though hating all of this. He works on writing the old newspaper articles in order to make history or past relevant to today’s party line.

He is efficient enough in spite of hating his bosses. Julia, a young girl who is morally very rigid comes into the fore. She too hates the system as much as Winston does. Gradually, they get into an affair but have to conceal their feelings for each other, as it will not be acceptable by Big Brother. In Big Brother’s bad world, freedom is slavery and ignorance is strength.

Book Review: Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell

George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighr is an astonishingly good book which practically (almost single-handedly) created and defined the ‘dystopian novel’ genre. This is undoubtedly the definitive dystopian novel which stands astride the genre like a colossus – head and shoulders above the rest.

Written in the year 1948 and first published in 1949, George Orwell’s dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four was originally designed as a satire of Stalinism. Like many of his contemporaries, George Orwell was distraught by the Soviet Union’s increasingly totalitarian interpretation of communism. The Soviet Union would collapse in 1991, of course, and communism plays a marginal role at best in today’s world. So how come Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell is currently enjoying a resurgence of popularity? How come it feels more and more relevant in a world dominated by capitalism rather than communism?

The fictional world of Nineteen Eighty-Four is under complete control of The Party and its mythical head, Big Brother. Privacy no longer exists: “ Big Brother is watching you ” – always. Data is collected, minds are molded, consent is manufactured. So-called “ telescreens ” monitor every facial expression and record every spoken word, tirelessly looking for “ thoughtcrimes “ while simultaneously broadcasting a never-ending stream of propaganda. No other source of information is available, so the loss of privacy comes with a loss of history and political agency.

“Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past.”

The Party is even in the process of developing what it calls “ newspeak ,” a stripped-down, ultimately impotent version of the English language that – through the reduction of grammar and vocabulary – renders subversive ideas unthinkable. Until “ newspeak ” takes over, “ doublethink ” ensures that those little inconsistencies between reality and the claims made by Big Brother (claims such as “ ignorance is strength ” or “ freedom is slavery ” or “ 2+2=5 ”) do not feel problematic in the slightest.

And even if they did, fabricated telescreen reports on what is portrayed as a brutal global war keep the masses in a perpetual state of fear that makes rebellion highly unlikely. Conveniently, this pseudo-war can also be used to justify the elimination of civil rights and liberties. And if there is someone somewhere who somehow manages to resist all this propaganda and surveillance (someone who, like our protagonist, manages to think an independent thought), Big Brother takes the old iron fist out of his pocket and enforces conformity through imprisonment and torture.

“Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood.”

In today’s world, the scope, sophistication and effectiveness of propaganda and surveillance have long surpassed anything George Orwell could have imagined in 1948. It is not the Communist Party that controls those endeavours, of course, but largely commercial enterprise (with a little help from the politicians it buys).

1984 by George Orwell portrays, with what now seems like terrifying accuracy a near future extreme totalitarian society and it is a novel that is as pertinent today as never before. In an age of ‘ fake news ’ ‘ counter-fake news ’ where truth is increasingly in question, a commodity to be perverted according to need, George Orwell’s 1984 reads like an increasingly and frighteningly accurate portrayal of what was then – a possible future and now a possible present.

Orwell’s concepts of thoughtcrime , doublethink , newspeak , sexcrime , the thought police , along with the wholesale and habitual use of propaganda, the deletion and re-writing of the news/history (‘ he who controls the future controls the past’ ) – historical revisionism, is all just so brilliantly conceived and executed and lest we forget, George Orwell wrote 1984 in year 1949. If it had not been so brilliantly executed, 1984 by George Orwell would undoubtedly have become very clichéd, tired and dated over the subsequent decades – which quite clearly it hasn’t.

“If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself.”

1984 is now so embedded at such a fundamental level in our culture, it is now almost impossible to imagine an absence of 1984 – itself a paradox considering the subject matter and themes of the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell. The concept now so oft used as common parlance of something being ‘Orwellian’ – surveillance and control.

What George Orwell has created in Nineteen Eighty-Four (once again and along with Animal Farm ) is simply one of the greatest short novels in the English language ever written, let alone one of the most influential – both in literary and cultural terms. The characters of Winston, Julia and O’Brien, Room 101, the surrounding events, the world of Oceania, Ingsoc and the Party remain seared into the readers’ memory with startling effectiveness long after the last page has been turned.

Nineteen Eighty-Four is an outstandingly (in every sense of the word) powerful, thought-provoking, compelling, engaging portrait of an all too feasible near future. Parallels in history are clearly there to see – the National Socialism of Hitler, the Communism of Stalin to name but two – showing us the absolute feasibility of such a world. The way that Orwell writes of the manipulation and creation / management of mass hysteria, the instillation and perpetuation of xenophobia and the unquestioning and blind allegiance to the ‘Party’ has such a feeling of authenticity and is all done so effectively and unbelievably well.

“Until they become conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious.”

I cannot overstate the brilliance of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, nor emphasise the power that this novel increasingly has, though perhaps to say that 1984 by George Orwell is quite simply a work of modern literary genius will go some way in conveying how truly great a novel this really is.

George Orwell’s 1984 paints a horrifying picture of a world that could so easily be – an intelligent portrayal of and warning against the evils of totalitarianism and extreme authoritarianism of any kind. But it is so much more than that, along with providing us with such a great central story – a story not solely about power, corruption and lies, but also about love, truth and the human spirit, Nineteen Eighty-Four works on so many, many levels. George Orwell’s 1984 is absolutely, unquestionably and unequivocally essential reading.

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A Summary and Analysis of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four , completed in 1948 and published a year later, is a classic example of dystopian fiction. Indeed, it’s surely the most famous dystopian novel in the world, even if its ideas are known by far more people than have actually read it. (According to at least one survey , Nineteen Eighty-Four is the book people most often claim to have read when they haven’t.)

Like many novels that are more known about than are carefully read and analysed, Nineteen Eighty-Four is actually a more complex work than the label ‘nightmare dystopian vision’ can convey. Before we offer an analysis of the novel’s themes and origins, let’s briefly recap the plot.

Nineteen Eighty-Four : plot summary

In the year 1984, Britain has been renamed Airstrip One and is a province of Oceania, a vast totalitarian superstate ruled by ‘the Party’, whose politics are described as Ingsoc (‘English Socialism’). Big Brother is the leader of the Party, which keeps its citizens in a perpetual state of fear and submission through a variety of means.

Surveillance is a key part of the novel’s world, with hidden microphones (which are found in the countryside as well as urban areas, and can identify not only what is said but also who says it) and two-way telescreen monitors being used to root out any dissidents, who disappear from society with all trace of their existence wiped out.

They become, in the language of Newspeak (the language used by people in the novel), ‘unpersons’. People are short of food, perpetually on the brink of starvation, and going about in fear for their lives.

The novel’s setting is London, where Trafalgar Square has been renamed Victory Square and the statue of Horatio Nelson atop Nelson’s Column has been replaced by one of Big Brother. Through such touches, Orwell defamiliarises the London of the 1940s which the original readers would have recognised, showing how the London they know might be transformed under a totalitarian regime.

The novel’s protagonist is Winston Smith, who works at the Ministry of Truth, rewriting historical records so they are consistent with the state’s latest version of history. However, even though his day job involves doing the work of the Party, Winston longs to escape the oppressive control of the Party, hoping for a rebellion.

Winston meets the owner of an antique shop named Mr Charrington, from whom he buys a diary in which he can record his true feelings towards the Party. Believing the working-class ‘proles’ are the key to a revolution, Winston visits them, but is disappointed to find them wholly lacking in any political understanding.

Meanwhile, hearing of the existence of an underground resistance movement known as the Brotherhood – which has been formed by the rival of Big Brother, a man named Emmanuel Goldstein – Winston suspects that O’Brien, who also works with him, is involved with this resistance.

At lunch with another colleague, named Syme, Winston learns that the English language is being rewritten as Newspeak so as to control and influence people’s thought, the idea being that if the word for an idea doesn’t exist in the language, people will be unable to think about it.

Winston meets a woman named Julia who works for the Ministry of Truth, maintaining novel-writing machines, but believes she is a Party spy sent to watch him. But then Julia passes a clandestine love message to him and the two begin an affair – which is itself illicit since the Party decrees that sex is for reproduction alone, rather than pleasure.

We gradually learn more about Winston’s past, including his marriage to Katherine, from whom he is now separated. Syme, who had been working on Newspeak, disappears in mysterious circumstances: something Winston had predicted.

O’Brien invites Winston to his flat, declaring himself – as Winston had also predicted – a member of the Brotherhood, the resistance against the Party. He gives Winston a copy of the book written by Goldstein, the leader of the Brotherhood.

When Oceania’s enemy changes during the ritual Hate Week, Winston is tasked with making further historical revisions to old newspapers and documents to reflect this change.

Meanwhile, Winston and Julia secretly read Goldstein’s book, which explains how the Party maintains its totalitarian power. As Winston had suspected, the secret to overthrowing the Party lies in the vast mass of the population known as the ‘proles’ (derived from ‘proletarian’, Marx’s term for the working classes). It argues that the Party can be overthrown if proles rise up against it.

But shortly after this, Winston and Julia are arrested, having been shopped to the authorities by Mr Charrington (whose flat above his shop they had been using for their illicit meetings). It turns out that both he and O’Brien work for the Thought Police, on behalf of the Party.

At the Ministry of Love, O’Brien tells Winston that Goldstein’s book was actually written by him and other Party members, and that the Brotherhood may not even exist. Winston endures torture and starvation in an attempt to grind him down so he will accept Big Brother.

In Room 101, a room in which a prisoner is exposed to their greatest fear, Winston is placed in front of a wire cage containing rats, which he fears above all else. Winston betrays Julia, wishing she could take his place and endure this suffering instead.

His reprogramming complete, Winston is allowed to go free, but he is essentially living under a death sentence: he knows that one day he will be summoned by the authorities and shot for his former treachery.

He meets Julia one day, and learns that she was subjected to torture at the Ministry of Love as well. They have both betrayed each other, and part ways. The novel ends with Winston accepting, after all, that the Party has won and that ‘he loved Big Brother.’

Nineteen Eighty-Four : analysis

Nineteen Eighty-Four is probably the most famous novel about totalitarianism, and about the dangers of allowing a one-party state where democracy, freedom of movement, freedom of speech, and even freedom of thought are all outlawed. The novel is often analysed as a warning about the dangers of allowing a creeping totalitarianism into Britain, after the horrors of such regimes in the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, and elsewhere had been witnessed.

Because of this quality of the book, it is often called ‘prophetic’ and a ‘nightmare vision of the future’, among other things.

However, books set in the future are rarely simply about the future. They are not mere speculation, but are grounded in the circumstances in which they were written.

Indeed, we might go so far as to say that most dystopian novels, whilst nominally set in an imagined future, are really using their future setting to reflect on what are already firmly established social or political ideas. In the case of Orwell and Nineteen Eighty-Four , this means the novel reflects the London of the 1940s.

By the time he came to write the novel, Orwell already had a long-standing interest in using his writing to highlight the horrors of totalitarianism around the world, especially following his experience fighting in the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s. As Orwell put it in his essay ‘ Why I Write ’, all of his serious work written since 1936 was written ‘ against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism’.

In his analysis of Nineteen Eighty-Four in his study of Orwell, George Orwell (Reader’s Guides) , Jeffrey Meyers argues convincingly that, rather than being a nightmare vision of the future, a prophetic or speculative work, Orwell’s novel is actually a ‘realistic synthesis and rearrangement of familiar materials’ – indeed, as much of Orwell’s best work is.

His talent lay not in original imaginative thinking but in clear-headed critical analysis of things as they are: his essays are a prime example of this. Nineteen Eighty-Four is, in Meyer’s words, ‘realistic rather than fantastic’.

Indeed, Orwell himself stated that although the novel was ‘in a sense a fantasy’, it is written in the form of the naturalistic novel, with its themes and ideas having been already ‘partly realised in Communism and fascism’. Orwell’s intention, as stated by Orwell himself, was to take the totalitarian ideas that had ‘taken root’ in the minds of intellectuals all over Europe, and draw them out ‘to their logical consequences’.

Like much classic speculative fiction – the novels and stories of J. G. Ballard offer another example – the futuristic vision of the author is more a reflection of contemporary anxieties and concerns. Meyers goes so far as to argue that Nineteen Eighty-Four is actually the political regimes of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia ‘transposed’ into London of the early 1940s, during the Second World War.

Certainly, many of the most famous features of Nineteen Eighty-Four were suggested to Orwell by his time working at the BBC in London in the first half of the 1940s: it is well-known that the Ministry of Truth was based on the bureaucratic BBC with its propaganda department, while the infamous Room 101 was supposedly named after a room of that number in the BBC building, in which Orwell had to endure tedious meetings.

The technology of the novel, too, was familiar by the 1940s, involving little innovation or leaps of imagination from Orwell (‘telescreens’ being a natural extension of the television set: BBC TV had been established in 1936, although the Second World War pushed back its development somewhat).

Orwell learned much about the workings of Stalinism from reading Trotsky’s The Revolution Betrayed (1937), written by one of the leading figures in the Russian Revolution of 1917 who saw Stalinist Russia as the antithesis of what Trotsky, Lenin, and those early revolutionaries had been striving to achieve. (This would also be important for Orwell’s Animal Farm , of course.)

And indeed, many of the details surrounding censorship – the rewriting of history, the suppression of dissident literature, the control of the language people use to express themselves and even to think in – were also derived from Orwell’s reading of life in Soviet Russia. Surveillance was also a key element of the Stalinist regime, as in other Communist countries in Europe.

The moustachioed figure of Big Brother in Nineteen Eighty-Four recalls nobody so much as Josef Stalin himself. Not only the ideas of ‘thought crime’ and ‘thought police’, but even the terms themselves, predate Orwell’s use of them: they were first recorded in a 1934 book about Japan.

One of the key questions Winston asks himself in Nineteen Eighty-Four is what the Party is trying to achieve. O’Brien’s answer is simple: the maintaining of power for its own sake. Many human beings want to control other human beings, and they can persuade a worrying number of people to go along with their plans and even actively support them.

Despite the fact that they are starving and living a miserable life, many of the people in Airstrip One love Big Brother, viewing him not as a tyrannical dictator but as their ‘Saviour’ (as one woman calls him). Again, this detail was taken from accounts of Stalin, who was revered by many Russians even though they were often living a wretched life under his rule.

Another key theme of Orwell’s novel is the relationship between language and thought. In our era of fake news and corrupt media, this has only become even more pronounced: if you lie to a population and confuse them enough, you can control them. O’Brien introduces Winston to the work of the traitor to the Party, Emmanuel Goldstein, only to tell him later that Goldstein may not exist and his book was actually written by the Party.

Is this the lie, or was the book the lie? One of the most famous lines from the novel is Winston’s note to himself in his diary: ‘Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.’

But later, O’Brien will force Winston to ‘admit’ that two plus two can make five. Orwell tells us, ‘The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears.’

Or as Voltaire once wrote, ‘Truly, whoever is able to make you absurd is able to make you unjust.’ Forcing somebody to utter blatant falsehoods is a powerful psychological tool for totalitarian regimes because through doing so, they have chipped away at your moral and intellectual integrity.

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5 thoughts on “A Summary and Analysis of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four”

1984 is a novel which is great in spite of itself and has been lionised for the wrong reasons. The title of the novel is a simple anagram of 1948, the date when the novel was written, and was driven by Orwell’s paranoia about the 1945 Labour government in UK. Orwell, a public school man, had built a reputation for hiself in the nineteen thirties as a socialist writer, and had fought for socialism in the Spanish civil war. The Road To Wigan Pier is an excellent polemic attacking the way the UK government was handling the mass unemployment of the time, reducing workers to a state of near starvation. In Homage To Catalonia, Orwell describes his experiences fighting with a small Marxist militia against Franco’s fascists. It was in Spain that Orwell developed his lifelong hatred of Stalinism, observing that the Communist contingents were more interested in suppressing other left-wing factions than in defeating Franco. The 1945 Labour government ws Britain’s first democratically elected socialist governement. It successfully established the welfare state and the National Health Service in a country almost bankrupted by the war, and despite the fact that Truman in USA was demanding the punctual repayment of wartime loans. Instead of rejoicing, Orwell, by now terminally ill from tuberculosis, saw the necessary continuation of wartime austerity and rationing as a deliberate and unnecessary imposition. Consequently, the book is often used as propaganda against socialism. The virtues of the book are the warnings about the dangers of giving the state too much power, in the form of electronic surveillance, ehanced police powers, intrusive laws, and the insidious use of political propaganda to warp peoples’ thinking. All of this has come to pass in the West as well as the East, but because of the overtly anticommunist spin to Orwell’s novel, most people fail to get its important message..

As with other work here, another good review. I’m also fascinated that Orwell located the government as prime problem, whereas Huxley located the people as prime problem, two sides of the same coin.

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1984 Book Summary – George Orwell

book cover of 1084 with a single eye watching...

06 Mar 1984 Book Summary – George Orwell

This review aims to dissect and analyze “1984” in its entirety, offering insights into its thematic richness, narrative style, and Orwell’s vision of a world subsumed by tyranny and propaganda.

Suggested Reading Age “1984” is best suited for readers aged 15 and above due to its complex themes and some mature content.

Thesis Statement Orwell’s “1984” is not just a novel but a warning, an intricate exploration of the dangers of political extremism and the loss of personal freedom.

Short Synopsis of 1984

“1984” by George Orwell is a dystopian novel that delves into the horrors of a totalitarian society under constant surveillance. Set in the superstate of Oceania, it follows Winston Smith, a member of the Outer Party, working at the Ministry of Truth. The Party, led by the elusive Big Brother, exercises absolute control over all aspects of life, including history, language, and even thought. Winston, feeling suppressed and rebellious, begins a forbidden love affair with Julia, a co-worker, as an act of defiance against the Party’s oppressive regime. However, their rebellion is short-lived as they are caught and subjected to brutal psychological manipulation and reconditioning by the Party. The novel explores themes of totalitarianism, propaganda, and the crushing of individuality, culminating in Winston’s tragic acceptance of the Party’s dominance. “1984” remains a powerful warning about the dangers of unchecked government power and the erosion of fundamental human rights.

1984 Detailed Book Summary

“1984” is set in a dystopian future where the world is divided into three superstates constantly at war: Oceania, Eurasia, and Eastasia. The story unfolds in Airstrip One (formerly Great Britain), a province of the totalitarian superstate of Oceania, which is under the control of the Party led by the figurehead Big Brother.

Winston Smith : The novel’s protagonist, Winston Smith, is a 39-year-old man who works at the Ministry of Truth, where his job is to alter historical records, thus aligning the past with the ever-changing party line of the present. Winston lives in a world of perpetual war, omnipresent government surveillance, and public manipulation.

Early Acts of Rebellion : Despite outwardly conforming, Winston harbors deep-seated hatred for the Party. He begins to express his subversive thoughts by starting a diary, an act punishable by death if discovered by the Thought Police. Through his writing, Winston explores his fragmented memories of the past, pondering the Party’s control over reality and truth.

Julia and the Love Affair : Winston becomes involved with Julia, a younger Party member who secretly shares his loathing of the regime. Their love affair is initially an act of rebellion. They meet in secret and dream of a life free from the Party’s control. Their relationship represents a profound act of personal freedom and rebellion against the regime.

O’Brien and the Brotherhood : Winston and Julia are drawn to O’Brien, an Inner Party member whom Winston believes to be secretly a member of a clandestine opposition group known as the Brotherhood, led by the legendary Emmanuel Goldstein. O’Brien inducts them into the Brotherhood, providing a copy of Goldstein’s subversive book which outlines the ideology of freedom and rebellion against the Party.

Capture and Betrayal : The illusion of rebellion is shattered when Winston and Julia are arrested in their sanctuary. It is revealed that their rebellion was a trap orchestrated by the Thought Police, with O’Brien as one of its agents.

Winston’s Imprisonment and Torture : In the Ministry of Love, Winston is separated from Julia and subjected to psychological and physical torture. The aim is to force him to confess his crimes against the Party and to break his spirit completely. Winston resists as much as he can, holding onto his inner sense of truth and loyalty to Julia.

Room 101 : The climax of Winston’s torture occurs in Room 101, where he is confronted with his worst fear – rats. In a moment of utter despair and terror, Winston betrays Julia, begging that she be tortured in his place. This ultimate betrayal represents the complete destruction of Winston’s resistance.

Re-education and Acceptance : Following his experience in Room 101, Winston undergoes a process of “re-education” where he learns to accept the Party’s version of reality and to love Big Brother. He is released back into society, a hollow, obedient citizen.

Final Encounter with Julia : After his release, Winston encounters Julia one more time. Both admit to betraying each other and realize that their feelings for each other have been eradicated. The Party’s victory is complete, with any trace of personal loyalty or love eradicated.

Winston’s Final Submission : The novel ends with Winston completely accepting the Party’s doctrine and viewing his execution as a victory – he has conformed entirely to the Party’s ideals. His final thoughts are of unquestioning love and loyalty to Big Brother, signifying the total and absolute triumph of the Party’s control over the individual mind and spirit.

Orwell’s “1984” is a powerful and chilling portrayal of a totalitarian world where freedom of thought is suppressed under the guise of state security, and the truth is what the Party deems it to be. It remains a poignant and cautionary tale about the dangers of unchecked political power and the erosion of individual liberties.

The novel delves into Winston’s life as he begins a forbidden love affair with Julia and gets involved with what appears to be an underground resistance movement. However, this rebellion is short-lived as they are betrayed and subjected to the Party’s ruthless tactics of psychological manipulation and physical torture, leading to Winston’s ultimate surrender to the Party’s orthodoxy.

Character Descriptions:

Winston Smith: Age: Approximately 39 years old. Occupation: Works at the Ministry of Truth, where he alters historical records to align with the Party’s current propaganda. Personality Traits: Initially, Winston exhibits intellectual curiosity, internal rebellion, and skepticism towards the Party’s doctrine. He is contemplative, introspective, and carries a sense of melancholy. Character Arc: Winston evolves from a quiet dissident to an active rebel, seeking truth and love in a society devoid of both. His relationship with Julia deepens his rebellious spirit. However, after his capture and torture, he becomes a defeated, loyal follower of Big Brother, losing his individuality and spirit of dissent.
Julia: Age: In her mid-20s. Occupation: Works on the novel-writing machines in the Fiction Department at the Ministry of Truth. Personality Traits: Julia is practical, sensual, and outwardly conforms to Party norms while secretly despising its control. She is bold and pragmatic in her approach to rebellion, focusing more on personal freedom than on broader political change. Character Arc: Julia engages in an affair with Winston as a form of personal rebellion. She is less interested in the theoretical aspects of their rebellion and more in the personal joy it brings. After their capture, like Winston, she is broken by the Party, ultimately betraying Winston and accepting Party doctrine.
O’Brien: Occupation: A member of the Inner Party. Personality Traits: O’Brien is intelligent, articulate, and initially seems sympathetic to Winston’s skepticism of the Party. He exudes a certain charm and civility. Character Arc: O’Brien reveals himself as a loyalist to the Party and plays a key role in Winston’s torture and re-education. He embodies the Party’s manipulative and brutal nature. His interactions with Winston highlight the Party’s deep understanding of human psychology and its use in breaking down resistance.
Big Brother: Role: The symbolic leader and face of the Party. Description: Big Brother is more a symbol than a character, representing the omnipresent, all-seeing Party. He is depicted as a mustachioed man appearing on posters and telescreens with the slogan “Big Brother is watching you.” His actual existence is ambiguous, but his presence is a powerful tool in the Party’s arsenal for instilling loyalty and fear.
Mr. Charrington: Occupation: Owner of an antique shop in the Proles district. Personality Traits: Initially appears as a kindly, old shopkeeper interested in history and artifacts from the past. Character Arc: Revealed to be a member of the Thought Police, his character highlights the Party’s extensive surveillance network and the deception employed to trap dissidents like Winston and Julia.

In-depth Analysis

Strengths : “1984” excels in its haunting portrayal of a society stripped of freedom and individuality. Orwell masterfully uses a bleak and concise prose style to convey the oppressive atmosphere of Oceania. The intricate depiction of the Party’s manipulation of truth and history remains particularly chilling and relevant.
Weaknesses : For some, the despairing tone and the inevitability of Winston’s defeat may come across as overly pessimistic, offering little in the way of hope or resistance against such a powerful system.
Uniqueness : The novel’s concept of “Newspeak,” the language designed to limit free thought, and “doublethink,” the ability to accept two contradictory beliefs, are unique contributions to the lexicon of political and philosophical thought.
Literary Devices : Orwell’s use of symbolism, foreshadowing, and irony are noteworthy. For instance, the figure of Big Brother symbolizes the impersonal and omnipresent power of the Party.
Relation to Broader Issues : The book’s exploration of surveillance, truth manipulation, and state control has clear parallels with modern concerns about privacy, fake news, and authoritarianism, making it perennially relevant.
Potential Audiences : “1984” is a must-read for enthusiasts of political and dystopian fiction. It is also highly valuable for those interested in political theory, sociology, and history.
Comparisons : “1984” often draws comparisons with Aldous Huxley’s “Brave New World,” another dystopian masterpiece, though Huxley’s work envisages a different form of control through hedonism and consumerism.
Final Recommendations : This novel is an essential read for understanding the extremes of political control and the fragility of human rights. It’s a cautionary tale that remains profoundly relevant in today’s world.

Thematic Analysis and Stylistic Elements

The themes of “1984” are deeply interwoven and reflect Orwell’s concerns about totalitarianism. Themes include the corruption of language as a tool for oppressive power (“Newspeak”), the erosion of truth and reality in politics, and the loss of individuality. Stylistically, Orwell’s direct and terse prose serves as a mirror to the stark world he describes, emphasizing the theme of decay and dehumanization.

Comparisons to Other Works

Orwell’s “Animal Farm,” a satirical allegory of Soviet totalitarianism, shares similar themes with “1984,” but differs in its approach and style, using a fable-like structure. “1984” is more direct and visceral in its depiction of a dystopian society.

Chapter by Chapter Summary of 1984

Chapter 1 : Winston Smith, a low-ranking member of the ruling Party in Oceania, returns to his flat in Victory Mansions. He begins to write a diary, an act prohibited by the Party.
Chapter 2 : Winston recalls recent Two Minutes Hate sessions and reflects on the Party’s control over Oceania’s history and residents. He hides his diary.
Chapter 3 : Winston dreams of his mother and sister, and then of O’Brien, an Inner Party member he believes may secretly oppose the Party. The chapter ends with Winston’s alarm waking him for the Physical Jerks, a mandatory morning exercise.
Chapter 4 : Winston goes to his job at the Ministry of Truth, where he alters historical records to fit the Party’s current version of events.
Chapter 5 : During lunch, Winston discusses the principles of Newspeak with a co-worker, Syme. He observes the Parsons family and considers the effectiveness of Party propaganda on children.
Chapter 6 : Winston thinks about his wife, Katharine, and their cold, lifeless marriage, reflecting on the Party’s repressive attitude towards sex and love.
Chapter 7 : Winston writes in his diary about the hopelessness of rebellion and the likelihood that he will be caught by the Thought Police. He ponders whether life was better before the Party took over.
Chapter 8 : Winston visits a prole neighborhood. He enters an antique shop and buys a coral paperweight. He talks with the shop owner, Mr. Charrington, and learns about life before the Party’s rule.
Chapter 9 : Oceania switches enemies from Eurasia to Eastasia. Winston receives Goldstein’s book and begins reading it.
Chapter 10 : Winston wakes up from a dream shouting, “Shakespeare!” He and Julia plan to rent the room above Mr. Charrington’s shop for their clandestine meetings.
Chapter 11 : In the rented room, Winston and Julia continue their secret meetings, but Winston feels the futility of their rebellion.
Chapter 12 : Winston reads to Julia from Goldstein’s book, explaining the social structure of Oceania and the perpetual war.
Chapter 13 : Winston continues reading the book, discussing the principles of war and the Party’s manipulation of the populace.
Chapter 14 : Winston and Julia are discovered by the Thought Police in their rented room. Mr. Charrington reveals himself as a member of the Thought Police.
Chapter 15 : Winston is detained in the Ministry of Love. He encounters other prisoners and realizes the Party’s extensive power.
Chapter 16 : O’Brien tortures Winston, gradually breaking his spirit. He admits to various crimes against the Party, both real and imagined.
Chapter 17 : O’Brien continues Winston’s re-education, revealing more about the Party’s ideology and the concept of doublethink.
Chapter 18 : Winston is taken to Room 101, where he is confronted with his worst fear—rats. He betrays Julia, proving his complete submission to the Party.
Chapter 19 : Winston is released and spends his time at the Chestnut Tree Café. He is a changed man, devoid of rebellious thoughts.
Chapter 20 : Winston meets Julia again, but their feelings for each other have vanished. They both admit to betraying each other.
Chapter 21 : The novel concludes with Winston, completely broken, confessing his love for Big Brother, accepting Party orthodoxy fully.

Potential Test Questions and Answers

Answer: It signifies the omnipresent surveillance of the Party and the constant monitoring of individuals’ actions and thoughts, instilling fear and obedience.
Answer: “Newspeak” is designed to diminish the range of thought by reducing the complexity and nuance of language, making rebellion against the Party’s ideology linguistically impossible.
Answer: The Thought Police serve to detect and punish “thoughtcrime,” any personal and political thoughts unapproved by the Party, thereby enforcing ideological purity and suppressing dissent.
“George Orwell: The Prophet of the Dystopian Future,” The Literary Encyclopedia.
“Totalitarianism and Language: Orwell’s 1984,” Journal of Modern Literature.

Awards and Recognition

“1984” has received critical acclaim since its publication and has been listed in various “best novels” lists, including the “100 Best Novels of the 20th Century” by the Modern Library.

Bibliographic Information

Publisher: Signet Book
Publish Date: July 01, 1950
Type: Mass Market Paperbound
ISBN/EAN/UPC: 9780451524935

Summaries of Other Reviews

The Guardian: Highlights the novel’s prophetic nature and its enduring relevance in the digital age.
The New Yorker: Discusses the novel’s profound impact on language and political thought.

Notable Quotes from 1984

This paradoxical slogan of the Party encapsulates the use of doublethink, a process of indoctrination that requires citizens to accept contradictory beliefs, fostering a disconnection from reality and thus ensuring loyalty to the Party.
This omnipresent warning is emblematic of the government’s pervasive surveillance in Oceania. It instills fear and obedience in the populace, reminding them of the Party’s constant monitoring of their actions and thoughts.
This reflects the Party’s manipulation of truth and its control over what is considered knowledge. It reveals the theme of reality control and the dangers of a society where objective truth is subjugated to political agenda.
This quote grimly summarizes the Party’s vision for the future: a world where the individual is utterly powerless, and the state exerts total control, both physically and psychologically.
This highlights the Party’s manipulation of history to maintain its grip on power. It underscores a central theme in “1984” — the control of information and history as a means of controlling the populace.
This defines the concept of doublethink, a crucial method by which the Party breaks down individual understanding of truth and reality, ensuring unconditional loyalty.
This statement underscores the significance of objective truth and the resistance against the Party’s distortion of reality. It signifies the importance of individual thought and rationality as a form of rebellion.
This conundrum highlights the challenge faced by those living under totalitarian rule, where the lack of consciousness about their oppression prevents rebellion, yet without rebelling, they cannot become fully aware of their subjugation.

Spoilers/How Does It End?

Warning: This section contains major spoilers about the ending of “1984” by George Orwell.

“1984” culminates in a harrowing and profoundly impactful conclusion that starkly illuminates the depths of the Party’s control over the individual.

Winston’s Transformation and Betrayal : After Winston Smith and Julia are captured by the Thought Police, they are separated and taken to the Ministry of Love for interrogation and re-education. The person responsible for Winston’s capture and subsequent torture is O’Brien, whom Winston had previously believed to be a fellow dissident. This betrayal is a crucial turning point in the novel, as it shatters Winston’s last hope for an organized rebellion against the Party.
The Room 101 Experience : Winston endures severe physical and psychological torture under O’Brien’s supervision. The climax of his torture occurs in Room 101, where prisoners are confronted with their worst fears. For Winston, this is a face cage filled with ravenous rats. Faced with this terror, Winston betrays Julia by begging for her to be tortured in his place. This moment is pivotal as it represents the complete breakdown of Winston’s resistance and the success of the Party in breaking his spirit.
Winston’s Reintegration into Society : After his release, Winston is a shell of his former self. He has been thoroughly brainwashed and now genuinely loves Big Brother. He spends his time at the Chestnut Tree Café, where other broken rebels gather. One day, he meets Julia again. They acknowledge that they betrayed each other and that their feelings for each other have been eradicated. This meeting underscores the Party’s complete victory in destroying individual loyalty and emotion, replacing them with loyalty to the Party alone.
The Final Act of Submission : The novel ends with Winston’s final submission to the Party’s ideology. He has a vision of being executed but realizes that he has won the victory over himself – he loves Big Brother. This chilling conclusion signifies the total and irrevocable triumph of the Party over the individual. Winston’s love for Big Brother is a symbol of the Party’s successful eradication of independent thought and the total reprogramming of the human psyche.

Orwell’s ending is stark and dystopian, offering no hope of rebellion or change. It serves as a powerful warning about the dangers of totalitarianism and the fragility of human rights and freedom under such regimes. The ending is deliberately unsettling, leaving the reader to contemplate the consequences of unchecked political power and the importance of safeguarding democratic values and individual liberties.

News, Notes, Talk

Read the first reviews of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four .

Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood.

George Orwell’s dystopian masterwork, Nineteen Eighty-Four , was first published seventy-four years ago today.

Set in a totalitarian London in an imagined future where all citizens are subject to constant government surveillance and historical reeducation, Nineteen Eighty-Four tells the story of Winston Smith, a mid-level everyman at the Ministry of Truth who dreams of rebellion and who falls in love with a fellow aspiring revolutionary named Julia.

Things… do not turn out well for the pair.

Here’s a look back at some of the novel’s very first reviews.

“Nineteen Eighty-Four goes through the reader like an east wind, cracking the skin, opening the sores; hope has died in Mr Orwell’s wintry mind, and only pain is known. I do not think I have ever read a novel more frightening and depressing; and yet, such are the originality, the suspense, the speed of writing and withering indignation that it is impossible to put down. The faults of Orwell as a writer—monotony, nagging, the lonely schoolboy shambling down the one dispiriting track—are transformed now he rises to a large subject.

“These wars are mainly fought far from the great cities and their objects are to use up the excessive productiveness of the machine, and yet to get control of rare raw materials or cheap native labour. It also enables the new governing class, who are modelled on the Stalinists, to keep down the standard of living and nullify the intelligence of the masses whom they no longer pretend to have liberated. The collective oligarchy can operate securely only on a war footing. It is with this moral corruption of absolute power that Mr Orwell’s novel is concerned.

“In the homes of Party members a tele-screen is fitted, from which canned propaganda continually pours, and on which the pictures of Big Brother, the leader…Also by this device the Thought Police, on endless watch for Thought Crime, can observe the people night and day. What precisely Thought Crime is no one knows; but in general it is the tendency to conceive a private life secret from the State. A frown, a smile, a sigh may betray the citizen, who has forgotten, for the moment, the art of ‘reality control’ or, in Newspeak, the official language, ‘doublethink.’

“The duty of the satirist is to go one worse than reality; and it might be objected that Mr Orwell is too literal, that he is too oppressed by what he sees, to exceed it. In one or two incidents where he does exceed, notably in the torture scenes, he is merely melodramatic: he introduces those rather grotesque machines which used to appear in terror stories for boys. But mental terrorism is his real subject.

“For Mr Orwell, the most honest writer alive, hypocrisy is too dreadful for laughter: it feeds his despair.

Though the indignation of Nineteen Eighty-Four is singeing, the book does suffer from a division of purpose. Is it an account of present hysteria, is it a satire on propaganda, or a world that sees itself entirely in inhuman terms? Is Mr Orwell saying, not that there is no hope, but that there is no hope for man in the political conception of man?”

– V.S. Pritchett, The New Statesman , June 18, 1949

“Though all ‘thinking people,’ as they are still sometimes called, must by now have more than a vague idea of the dangers which mankind runs from modern techniques, George Orwell , like Aldous Huxley, feels that the more precise we are in our apprehensions the better. Huxley’s Ape and Essence was in the main a warning of the biological evils the split atom may have in store for us; Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four speaks of the psychological breaking-in process to which an up-to-date dictatorship can subject non-cooperators.

The story is brilliantly constructed and told. Winston Smith, of the Party (but not the Inner Party) kicks against the pricks, with what results we shall leave readers to find out for themselves. It has become a dreadful occasion of anguish to-day conjecturing how much torture even a saint can put up with if the end is certainly not to be a spectacular martyrdom—but ‘vaporisation.’ The less you are familiar with the idea of the agent provocateur as an instrument of oppression and rule the more you will shudder at the wiles used by the Ministry of Love in Mr. Orwell’s London of 1984, ‘chief city of Airstrip One, Oceana.’ An example of the way things are managed: Emmanuel Goldstein, the proscribed Opposition leader, is a fiction artfully sustained by the authorities to lure deviationists into giving themselves away.

It is an instructive book; there is a good deal of What Every Young Person Ought to Know—not in 1984, but 1949. Mr Orwell’s analysis of the lust for power is one of the less satisfactory contributions to our enlightenment, and he also leaves us in doubt as to how much he means by poor Smith’s ‘faith’ in the people (or ‘proles’). Smith is rather let down by the 1984 Common Man, and yet there is some insinuation that common humanity remains to be extinguished.

– The Guardian , June 10, 1949

“In Britain 1984 A.D., no one would have suspected that Winston and Julia were capable of crimethink (dangerous thoughts) or a secret desire for ownlife (individualism). After all, Party-Member Winston Smith was one of the Ministry of Truth’s most trusted forgers; he had always flung himself heart & soul into the falsification of government statistics. And Party-Member Julia was outwardly so goodthinkful (naturally orthodox) that, after a brilliant girlhood in the Spies, she became active in the Junior Anti-Sex League and was snapped up by Pornosec, a subsection of the government Fiction Department that ground out happy-making pornography for the masses. In short, the grim, grey London Times could not have been referring to Winston and Julia when it snorted contemptuously: ‘Old-thinkers unbellyfeel Ingsoc,’ i.e., ‘Those whose ideas were formed before the Revolution cannot have a full emotional understanding of the principles of English Socialism.’

How Winston and Julia rebelled, fell in love and paid the penalty in the terroristic world of tomorrow is the thread on which Britain’s George Orwell has spun his latest and finest work of fiction. In Animal Farm, Orwell parodied the Communist system in terms of barnyard satire; but in 1984 … there is not a smile or a jest that does not add bitterness to Orwell’s utterly depressing vision of what the world may be in 35 years’ time.”

“Most novels about an imaginary world have as their central character, or interpreter, a man who somehow strays out of the author’s own time and finds himself in a world he never made. But Orwell, like Aldous Huxley in Brave New World , builds his nightmare of tomorrow on foundations that are firmly laid today. He needs to contemporary spokesman to explain and interpret—for the simple reason that any reader in 1949 can uneasily see his own shattered features in Winston Smith, can scent in the world of 1984 a stench that is already familiar.”

– TIME, June 20, 1949

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George Orwell | 4.34 | 4,264,855 ratings and reviews

Ranked #1 in 20th Century , Ranked #1 in Hope — see more rankings .

Reviews and Recommendations

We've comprehensively compiled reviews of 1984 from the world's leading experts.

Richard Branson Founder/Virgin Group Today is World Book Day, a wonderful opportunity to address this #ChallengeRichard sent in by Mike Gonzalez of New Jersey: Make a list of your top 65 books to read in a lifetime. (Source)

Steve Jobs Founder/Apple called this book "one of his favorite" and recommended it to the hires. The book also inspired one the greatest TV ad (made by Jobs) (Source)

Emma Watson Recommends this book

Matt Mullenweg Founder & CEO/Automattic Recommends this book

Chan Koonchung Nineteen Eighty-Four is seriously read in China by intellectuals, who see similarities between the world of George Orwell and present-day China. (Source)

Robert Service The book looks at how order and disorder co-habit. Orwell, without ever having gone to the USSR, understood it from the outside brilliantly. (Source)

Chris Abbott Orwellian has come to mean the kind of surveillance state we live in today, with all the CCTV. It’s not a prophetic book but it’s a warning. (Source)

Tristan Harris Recommends this book

Roxana Bitoleanu [One of the books that had the biggest impact on ] 1984, the future we are living today envisioned way back. (Source)

Ella Botting This book marked a fundamental shift in my mental model and the way I process and consider things. This book taught to never take things at face value and to always challenge information that is presented to me, both of these skills make me a better researcher. It taught me to be empathetic and was a stark reminder that things aren’t always what they seem, on a personal and on a macro level. Considering it’s eerie similarities to the society we now live in, it also taught me to be cautious of systems of governance but not in an over-the-top conspiracy theory way. [...] This book enabled me to... (Source)

Igor Debatur Question: What five books would you recommend to young people interested in your career path & why? Answer: The Glass Bead Game by Herman Hesse Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco The Antichrist by Friedrich Nietzsche The Castle by Franz Kafka 1984 by George Orwell and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley (Source)

Santiago Basulto And non-business is even harder, but I’d probably choose 1984; its power and narrative are just amazing. (Source)

Stephane Grand Everybody, whether they decide to spend their lives in a police state or not, needs to read 1984. It is a book about moral choices, being different, and being broken. (Source)

Sol Orwell Question: What books had the biggest impact on you? Perhaps changed the way you see things or dramatically changed your career path. Orwell's Animal Farm and 1984 (though Huxley's Brave New World is a better reflection of today's society). (Source)

Andra Zaharia These books and their core ideas have stuck with me the most and continue to guide me when I hit crossroads along the way. (Source)

Juan Mendez It alerts us to the danger of unfettered state power, which under any circumstance always ends up committing violations against individuals. (Source)

Jordan Peterson [Jordan Peterson recommended this book on his website.] (Source)

P J O’Rourke It’s eerily predictive of the sort of video camera surveillance world that we now live in. It would be interesting to update 1984 and make all of the things that Orwell foresaw more annoying than dangerous. (Source)

D J Taylor In terms of how technology is working in our modern surveillance powers, it’s a terrifyingly prophetic book in some of its implications for 21st-century human life. Orwell would deny that it was prophecy; he said it was a warning. But in fact, distinguished Orwell scholar Professor Peter Davis once made a list of all the things that Orwell got right, and it was a couple of fairly long paragraphs, and it was really rather terrifying. (Source)

Rankings by Category

1984 is ranked in the following categories:

#4 in 10th Grade
#4 in 11th Grade
#3 in 12th Grade
#4 in 15-Year-Old
#4 in 16-Year-Old
#3 in 17-Year-Old
#3 in 18-Year-Old
#4 in Abstract
#3 in Adult
#1 in Amazon Free
#3 in Banned
#6 in Bibliography
#1 in Bucket List
#2 in Catalog
#2 in Censorship
#3 in Class
#1 in Classic
#1 in Classic Sci-Fi
#4 in Classical
#1 in Collection
#3 in Communism
#3 in Conspiracy
#2 in Controversial
#2 in Copenhagen
#1 in Dramatic
#1 in Dystopian
#1 in English
#2 in Entertaining
#2 in Entertainment
#4 in Facebook
#6 in Farm Animal
#4 in Fascism
#2 in Folio Society
#6 in Futurism
#1 in Gilmore Girls
#2 in Goodreads
#3 in High School
#2 in High School Reading
#2 in Important
#3 in Influential
#6 in Intellectual
#2 in Interesting
#2 in Kindle Unlimited
#1 in Learning English
#2 in Leather
#1 in Leather Bound
#1 in Library
#5 in Life Changing
#2 in Literary
#1 in Literature
#3 in London
#2 in Loneliness
#1 in Mindfuck
#1 in Modern
#2 in Modern Classic
#6 in Modernism
#2 in Modernist
#2 in Must-Read
#1 in Novel
#1 in Online
#4 in Options
#2 in Paperback
#1 in Politics
#5 in Possession
#1 in Poster
#2 in Propaganda
#5 in Quarantine
#4 in Rated
#5 in Recent
#6 in Recommended
#6 in Revolution
#1 in Roman
#2 in Satire
#2 in Sci-Fi Horror
#2 in Science Fiction
#6 in Social
#3 in Socialism
#1 in Spelling
#6 in Story
#2 in Summer Reading
#5 in Suspenseful
#1 in Thought-Provoking
#2 in To-Read
#3 in Top Ten
#5 in Trigger Warning
#1 in Twisted
#4 in University
#1 in Utopian

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1984 Summary

1-Sentence-Summary: 1984 is the story of a man questioning the system that keeps his futuristic but dystopian society afloat and the chaos that quickly ensues once he gives in to his natural curiosity and desire to be free.

Favorite quote from the author:

Table of Contents

Video Summary

1984 book summary, 1984 review, who would i recommend our 1984 summary to.

“The best books are those that tell you what you know already,” Winston Smith concludes as he finally leafs through the pages of a forbidden book he’d been dying to get his hands on. In that sense, 1984 by George Orwell is indeed a great book: Most of us know the word “totalitarian” indicates something bad, but only after reading a dystopian classic like this will we truly understand what an absolute government might look like in practice.

Orwell had been an Imperial policeman in Burma (modern-day Myanmar) and fought in the Spanish Civil War. He later worked as a journalist during World War II. As such, he had seen the terrifying impact of governments with complete control both first- and second-hand in Spain, Russia, and Germany.

Published in 1949, 1984 was his warning to Western nations not to succumb to then-popular communist ideas. Despite leaning more left than right himself, Orwell feared unquestioned socialism would, ultimately, escalate into a government practicing systematic oppression — and could do so within the next 35 years.

The book has since become an often-quoted literary classic, taught in classrooms around the world. It is routinely praised for its important themes, strong symbolism, and, in some cases, accurate vision.

I recently read the book for the first time. Here are three lessons from this hall-of-fame piece of English literature:

The most powerful way to either control or empower humans is language.
Freedom is the ability to say what’s true, to say what you think, and to make your own choices.
Totalitarian governments succeed when they turn off our individuality via gaslighting.

Note : Since this is a historically important book, we decided to give it twice the word-space of our usual reads. We hope you think the extra length is worth it. We tried to include the most relevant plot points as well as teach you some valuable lessons along the way. Let’s discover some of the great ideas from 1984 !

If you want to save this summary for later, download the free PDF and read it whenever you want.

Lesson 1: Language is the defining way in which humans are either empowered or controlled.

The book is structured into three parts, and in the first, we get to know the protagonist Winston Smith. At nearly 40 years old and in bad physical shape, Winston is somewhat of an anti-hero. He works in the Ministry of Truth in London, which is part of Oceania, one of three large superstates , who are constantly at war with one another.

Winston’s job at the record department is to, ironically, falsify historic records. The goal is to erase everything that contradicts or makes “the Party,” the governing political power, look bad. Originals are burned in giant furnaces, and every newspaper article gets rewritten every time the Party decides a new reality is in order.

One of Winston’s colleagues works on the Party’s latest edition of the “Newspeak” dictionary. Newspeak is a language devised specifically to eliminate rebellious thinking at the root. Think about it: If you didn’t have the vocabulary to express an idea, wouldn’t that also make you less likely to think of that idea in the first place?

For example, if the word “freedom” was erased from the English language, would Americans still understand it the way it was meant in the Constitution? In the book, the word “free” still exists, but by means of deleting many other words associated with it, future “Newspeakers” would only be able to use it “in such statements as ‘This dog is free from lice.'” Political or intellectual freedom “no longer existed even as concepts, and were therefore of necessity nameless.”

The form of language shapes how we can express ourselves, and how we can express ourselves shapes how and what we think. Therefore, language may be the single-most important way to either empower or enslave humans. This concept is called linguistic relativity . It’s a little overstated, but in a way, “if you have no means of saying it, you can’t think it.”

“If thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought,” Winston notes at one point. Cherish your words, and be mindful of them.

Lesson 2: Freedom means being able to say what’s true, what you believe, and to make your own decisions.

Besides altering language and falsifying history, the Party also controls its citizens via more direct means. For one, everyone could be a spy, and children regularly report their parents to “the Thought Police,” a sort of Gestapo which makes inconvenient people vanish at a moment’s notice.

Another theme in the book is using technology to practice mass surveillance . Every home has a “telescreen,” a monitor that’s both recording and broadcasting at all times, and there are cameras and microphones everywhere.

In a society like that, rebellion starts with little acts, such as Winston writing into a diary in a corner of his apartment that’s hidden from the screen. In the second part of the book, however, he takes his disobedience to the next level by starting an affair with Julia, a coworker.

At first, Winston thinks Julia is a spy, but when she gives him a love note, the two begin meeting in secret, sleeping together, and commiserating about how much they hate the Party. There is, however, one key difference between them: Julia has no interest in overthrowing the Party. “If you keep the small rules you can break the big ones,” she observes, and as long as she can do what she wants right under the Party’s nose, she is happy .

Winston, however, more desperately wishes for a better future — not that he could do much to bring one about. Julia’s definition of freedom begins and ends with her choices, whereas Winston thinks freedom also means being able to think and say what is true and what you truly believe. “Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows,” he writes into his diary. “To die hating them,” the Party, that is, “that was freedom.”

If a government allows its citizens limited means to form an identity and actualize themselves, its people still isn’t free. Freedom includes permission to speak both facts and lies, to say what you think irrespective of whether it is right or wrong, and without these freedoms, all the others mean significantly less.

Lesson 3: A totalitarian state wins when it can gaslight its citizens into giving up their individuality.

In 2020, just as the pandemic came into full force, Julio Vincent Gambuto told us to “ prepare for the ultimate gaslighting .” “Pretty soon, as the country begins to figure out how we ‘open back up’ and move forward, very powerful forces will try to convince us all to get back to normal.” Of course, normal had disappeared, Gambuto warned. The future would — and probably should — look very different, but if we let greedy, marketing-savvy corporations steamroll us yet again, we’d gain nothing from the great pause we had been given.

In this case, the evil Gambuto referred to was consumerism, but gaslighting, defined as “manipulating someone using psychological methods into questioning their own sanity or powers of reasoning,” is also what totalitarian governments use to bend citizens to their will.

Just before, in the last part of the book, the inevitable happens — Winston and Julia get caught by the Thought Police — Winston concludes that “sanity is not statistical.” What he means is that “there is truth and there is untruth, and if you cling to the truth even against the whole world, you are not mad.” If your government can make you think you’re mad, however, it just might get you to give up the truth in favor of a lie that’s more convenient for them. This is how totalitarian governments win: They get you to reject not just the truth but any kind of individual thinking whatsoever.

After their capture, Winston and Julia are separated, and both are tortured into not just compliance but becoming mindless Party drones like everyone else. As it turns out, Winston’s coworker O’Brien, whom he thought to be a fellow secret rebel, is actually a high-level Inner Party member, eager to brainwash him into loyalty to the Party.

Having had little individuality to begin with due to the short material leash the state kept him on, Winston is now forced to give up his last shred of self thanks to months of physical and psychological abuse. O’Brien doesn’t just get him to lie about basic reality, such as claiming he holds up five fingers when he’s only holding up four, but also to pretend Oceania has always been at war with the same enemy when, in fact, telescreens frequently announce differing warring factions.

The ultimate gaslighting, however, happens when he makes Winston doubt reality altogether and, as such, the importance of thinking for himself: “If he THINKS he floats off the floor, and if I simultaneously THINK I see him do it, then the thing happens,” Winston muses. “It doesn’t really happen. We imagine it. It is hallucination. What knowledge have we of anything, save through our own minds? All happenings are in the mind. Whatever happens in all minds, truly happens.”

This is Winston’s final admission of defeat. After all, if the Party can rewrite history as it sees fit, it can dictate “whatever happens in all minds” and, therefore, what “truly happens.” When he returns to the real world, he is happy to drink the same gin he has always been drinking, sit at the same bar he’s always been sitting in, and no longer cares about expressing himself in any way whatsoever. Not with Julia. Nor in a diary. Not even through rebellious thoughts. Deep down, he still knows the state propaganda is nothing but lies, but from now on, he’s happy to go along with it, no longer strong enough to resist.

When other people gaslight us, it’s annoying and sad. When our governments do it, it’s dangerous, an immediate sign to take a stand and cling to the truth with all we’ve got. Always think twice about what your government does and says. Big Brother is watching.

Besides the fact that it is well-structured, relatively easy to understand, and successfully relies on a few strong characters to drive its points home, 1984 has held up incredibly well over time, and not just because of its predictive powers. If you read the book today, you’ll hardly feel transported to a different century. While Winston isn’t exactly carrying around a smartphone, the book’s everyday backdrop still feels technologically close enough to today to make it easy to immerse yourself in its world.

All in all, this is an outstanding book with several important, cautionary messages, some of which we should heed today. What happens if news blogs change their headlines after publication? What role does misinformation play in elections? Can our smartphones listen to us while we sleep? All of these are questions Winston Smith would ask were he alive in our world today. Reading his story will help us answer them.

While I would recommend this book to anyone, you’ll find it an especially great read if you’re concerned about freedom and sovereignty . For more context on its publication and Orwell’s ideas, check out Wikipedia . You can also dive into our list of the best and most important quotes from the book . Final fun fact: It is one of the top 15 books recommended by Jordan Peterson .

The 17-year-old climate activist who’s not happy with how their government is handling global warming, the 55-year-old who thinks their government will surely take care of them in retirement, and anyone who’s suspicious of technology’s long-term impact on our mental and societal health.

Last Updated on May 6, 2024

Niklas Göke

Niklas Göke is an author and writer whose work has attracted tens of millions of readers to date. He is also the founder and CEO of Four Minute Books, a collection of over 1,000 free book summaries teaching readers 3 valuable lessons in just 4 minutes each. Born and raised in Germany, Nik also holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration & Engineering from KIT Karlsruhe and a Master’s Degree in Management & Technology from the Technical University of Munich. He lives in Munich and enjoys a great slice of salami pizza almost as much as reading — or writing — the next book — or book summary, of course!

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BOOK REVIEW: 1984 by George Orwell

written by David Steffen

In the future of the story, there are only three super-nations across the entire globe–Oceania (which contains the former United States and United Kingdom among others), Eurasia, and Eastasia. The three super-nations are constantly at war with another in ever-shifting alliances. The super-nations are all authoritarian states, which maintain control by a combination of ever-present surveillance, constant revision of history, and the limitation destruction of language.

The protagonist of the story is Winston Smith, a writer working for the Ministry of Truth in Airstrip One (the modern name of the region that had once been England. Every day he makes “corrections” to historical records, part of a systematic and ongoing rewriting of history to suit the goals of the Party. The Party is the political group in power under the leadership of the tyrant Big Brother. Winston is a member of the Party (though not of the super-elite Inner Party), and in exchange for some small comforts over the lower-class proles he must live with constant surveillance and expectations of his every behavior as they even try to police his very thoughts. On the surface he is like any other person, seeming to fit in. But in his heart of hearts he feels a growing rebellion against the oppressive social environment.

As part of his job, Winston is well-versed in Newspeak, the official language of government communications which is phasing into becoming an official language of everyone. Newspeak is the only language in history whose vocabulary decreases from year to year, an intentional destruction of nuance and opposing viewpoints to stifle criticism and debate of political views–when the transition to newspeak is complete, the language will only be usable to express ideas approved by the Party, anything else will not be able to be expressed in speech and therefore will not even be able to be expressed in thought. There are rumors of an underground rebellion, but Winston isn’t sure if they are anything but rumors.

1984 is a cautionary tale warning about the ways of power-mongering political groups who exist only to increase their own power and will do so by any means at their disposal. I had been familiar with the surveillance basis of Oceania, but the detailed discussion of the destruction of language to suit political purposes was chilling and new to me because it felt all too familiar–limited vocabulary, using established terms incorrectly so that no one can be sure what is meant by them, statements in polar opposition to the actions at the same time like a magician distracting you with a wave of their hand.

The book does have a bit of a reputation for being a bit pedantic, and that’s not inaccurate–there are entire chapters in the book which are chapters from a political book within the book explaining the basis of the society. But, honestly, those chapters were some of the best in the book–a lot of detail laid out quite concisely and I was discovering it as Winston was discovering it so my reaction was his. You can look at it as just a long political discussion, but I thought Winston was a believable if not entirely likable character.

It is also a romance, at least for part of the book, something I didn’t expect, the element of which is in stark contrast with the constant control of the society of Big Brother.

I wish it felt more fictional. It is disheartening that after nearly seventy years, we have apparently not learned anything to end up with these leaders over and over again. Although I guess to look on the optimistic side perhaps we haven’t reached the point of no return that has been reached in 1984 with no apparent way out. I read the book now because I kept hearing references to it with the current administration, and it is very relevant now (maybe it is always this relevant, but the resemblance seems almost derivative at the moment).

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David Steffen

David Steffen is an editor, publisher, and writer. If you like what he does you can visit the Support page or buy him a coffee ! He is probably best known for being co-founder and administrator of The Submission Grinder , a donation-supported tool to help writers track their submissions and find publishers for their work . David is also the editor-in-chief here at Diabolical Plots . He is also the editor and publisher of The Long List Anthology: More Stories From the Hugo Award Nomination List series. David also (sometimes) writes fiction, and you can follow on BlueSky for updates on cross-stitch projects and occasionally other things. View all posts by David Steffen

George Orwell

Ask LitCharts AI: The answer to your questions

Welcome to the LitCharts study guide on George Orwell's 1984 . Created by the original team behind SparkNotes, LitCharts are the world's best literature guides.

1984: Introduction

1984: plot summary, 1984: detailed summary & analysis, 1984: themes, 1984: quotes, 1984: characters, 1984: symbols, 1984: literary devices, 1984: theme wheel, brief biography of george orwell.

Historical Context of 1984

Other books related to 1984.

Full Title: Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Novel
When Written: 1945-49; outline written 1943
Where Written: Jura, Scotland
When Published: June 1949
Literary Period: Late Modernism
Genre: Novel / Satire / Parable
Setting: London in the year 1984
Climax: Winston is tortured in Room 101
Antagonist: O'Brien
Point of View: Third-Person Limited

Extra Credit for 1984

Outspoken Anti-Communist. Orwell didn't just write literature that condemned the Communist state of the USSR. He did everything he could, from writing editorials to compiling lists of men he knew were Soviet spies, to combat the willful blindness of many intellectuals in the West to USSR atrocities.

Working Title. Orwell's working title for the novel was The Last Man in Europe .

Quizzes, saving guides, requests, plus so much more.

Read TIME’s Original Review of <i>Nineteen Eighty-Four</i>

Read TIME’s Original Review of Nineteen Eighty-Four

G eorge Orwell was already an established literary star when his masterwork Nineteen Eighty-Four was published on this day in 1949, but that didn’t stop TIME’s reviewer from being pleasantly surprised by the book. After all, even the expectation that a book would be good doesn’t mean one can’t be impressed when it turns out to be, as TIME put it, “absolutely super.”

One of the reasons, the review suggested, was Orwell’s bet that his fictional dystopia would not actually seem so foreign to contemporary readers. They would easily recognize many elements of the fictional world that TIME summed up as such:

In Britain 1984 A.D., no one would have suspected that Winston and Julia were capable of crimethink (dangerous thoughts) or a secret desire for ownlife (individualism). After all, Party-Member Winston Smith was one of the Ministry of Truth’s most trusted forgers; he had always flung himself heart & soul into the falsification of government statistics. And Party-Member Julia was outwardly so goodthinkful (naturally orthodox) that, after a brilliant girlhood in the Spies, she became active in the Junior Anti-Sex League and was snapped up by Pornosec, a subsection of the government Fiction Department that ground out happy-making pornography for the masses. In short, the grim, grey London Times could not have been referring to Winston and Julia when it snorted contemptuously: “Old-thinkers unbellyfeel Ingsoc,” i.e., “Those whose ideas were formed before the Revolution cannot have a full emotional understanding of the principles of English Socialism.” How Winston and Julia rebelled, fell in love and paid the penalty in the terroristic world of tomorrow is the thread on which Britain’s George Orwell has spun his latest and finest work of fiction. In Animal Farm (TIME, Feb. 4, 1946,) Orwell parodied the Communist system in terms of barnyard satire; but in 1984 … there is not a smile or a jest that does not add bitterness to Orwell’s utterly depressing vision of what the world may be in 35 years’ time.

Decades later, as the real-life 1984 approached, TIME dedicated a cover story to Orwell’s earlier vision of what that year could have been like. “That Year Is Almost Here,” the headline proclaimed . But obsessing over how it matched up to its fictional depiction was missing the point, the article posited. “The proper way to remember George Orwell, finally, is not as a man of numbers—1984 will pass, not Nineteen Eighty–Four—but as a man of letters,” wrote Paul Gray, “who wanted to change the world by changing the word.”

Read the full 1949 review, here in the TIME Vault: Where the Rainbow Ends

LIST: The 100 Best Young Adult Books of All Time

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1984 by George Orwell, book of a lifetime: An absorbing, deeply affecting political thriller

The novel creates a world so plausible, so complete that to read it is to experience another world, says jonathan freedland, article bookmarked.

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John Hurt as Winston Smith in the film version of 1984

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So much of it has entered the language, becoming a settled part of our common cultural inheritance, that it's easy to forget that 1984 was ever a book at all. From Big Brother to Doublethink, the landscape of the dystopia George Orwell created in 1949 exists in the minds even of those who've never picked up the novel. It has become a shorthand for totalitarianism, for the surveillance state, for the power of the mass media to manipulate public opinion, history and even the truth – and, in the process, has allowed people to forget that it remains a story to be read.

Even those who manage to look beyond its place in the folk memory, and do it the honour of assessing it as a novel, rarely see it for what it is – which is a political thriller. Not just a political thriller, but an exemplar: the very model of the form. It does what every novel in the genre should do – combining the illumination of an intriguing idea and the telling of a cracking story. When people discuss 1984, they tend to talk about Orwell's achievement of the former – his fully realised portrayal of life under a brutal one-party dictatorship – but when people read the book, as I did as a young teenager, what holds them is the fate of its protagonist, Winston Smith, his lover Julia, and their doomed attempt to taste freedom. The book succeeds because it is no manifesto, but an absorbing, deeply affecting story.

It has its defects, of course. Generations of young readers, and not just them, have surely yearned to skip at least some of the treatise by Emmanuel Goldstein, the Trotsky-esque dissident and public enemy whose forbidden work comes into Winston's hands. But little of that matters. The novel creates a world so plausible, so complete that to read it is to experience another world. And what higher goal can fiction reach for than that? And yet it rests on that simple, two-word question on which most political thrillers are built: what if? Orwell asked himself what Britain would look like if it fell prey to either one of the totalitarian creeds that dominated the mid-20th century. From that basic inquiry, 1984 was born.

Robert Harris's Fatherland sprung from asking, "What if Britain lost the war?" Michael Crichton created Jurassic Park by wondering, "What if we could bring dinosaurs back to life?" My new novel asks, "What if China dominates the world? What will life be like?" It's not only journalists who should be in awe of George Orwell. Anyone embarking on a political thriller should look to 1984 – to see how it's done.

Jonathan Freedland's new novel 'The Third Woman' is published by HarperCollins

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1984 | George Orwell | Book Review

After a long time, I got my hands on something that wasn’t about the affairs of the world or decoding Tharoor’s onerous and demanding vocabulary while finding my way out to the conclusion of the book.

But little did I know that those 300 pages made more sense than any philosopher or great thinker ever did with his narratives about the world and its astounding power politics. And to make it as dramatic as fictions are, it sure wasn’t ‘your average fiction’.

George Orwell’s 1984 has been a timeless classic , yet there is something contemporary about it. Fascinated by its constant appeal for so many generations, I decided to take part in the conspiracy myself. Completing 100 pages a day of an ebook didn’t feel like an achievement till I did not reach the appendix of the work.

The impact of the book was so that the thought of it didn’t leave my head for hours and hours throughout the day. It felt as if it was written in this time and age and was so close to the living reality that it felt worth not escaping.

The paradox in Winston Smith’s life was one thing that would leave you gazing at the screen for days straight. While his sheer capability of comprehending the concept of real freedom was noteworthy, it was remarkable to witness the dilemma his mind was going through while trying to differentiate between reality and illusion that was constantly present because of the intense stare by Big Brother’s eyes and the invisible curve under his moustache which was inevitable to ignore.

The features were so definite that the presence of Big Brother felt almost real. His impressions were literally present in every form and everywhere, be it physically (or mentally).

Every object, living or dead, witnessed Big Brother everywhere, in the form of the posters and advertisements and telescreen and songs and Hate Hours organized by the party and the development of kids into Spies in their blue uniforms and so on. It was a never-ending trail of praises for Big Brother and his ideology of state control.

It’s left unsaid if Big Brother existed in reality or not, but every single movement and every single breath of the people were guided by his words “Big Brother Is Watching You”.

Winston Smith’s efforts to face his dilemmas and accept the reality around him made him understand his disliking for the state and its despotic ministries.

DESPITE TRYING HARD ENOUGH TO STAND AGAINST THE REGIME, BUT WITH ALL CAUTION TO AVOID THE ARREST UNDER ‘THOUGHTCRIME’, WINSTON FAILS TO MOVE THINGS ACCORDING TO HIS PLANS.

The book takes you through a rollercoaster ride of sentiments, that a human brain can perceive and reflect, without breaking the flow of the story. From a supposedly brave love story which you root for, to the failure of Winston’s decision-making instincts, you feel vexed, dismay, betrayal, heartbroken, all at once.

In 1984, the narration is so overwhelming that you are left to absorb all those nail-biting endings that you were not prepared for. And all of this coming out of just a three hundred-page fiction leaves you amused.

It’s difficult to let go of the fact that a mere fiction, written in the 1940s has enough strength to make you realize that the existence of power play and human exploitation in the non-fictional world is in no way different from what Smith lives every day.

It is not just an anxious story about the state and the use of its unfair means to do as it pleases, but also about human relations with one another. A story where parents can’t trust their own children, a colleague can’t sit with another colleague, an individual unable to even think the thoughts of his liking, a story about extensive inequality, and a story of an utter betrayal by your own instincts that get you in the hands of your enemy, served as a fresh fish.

It’s a bird’s eye view of the world that lives amidst conformity and surveillance of the people, by people.

The conclusion makes you realize that Orwell was a child of his time who knew more than any other nearing generation of fully evolved human intellectuals. Or maybe he just wanted to be honest to the growing generation who was about to read his excellent work that portrayed a clear picture of human psychology and the greed for power behind the smokescreen of 1984.

It’s an uncompromising reminder for us to have a look at the present and ever-evolving global stage to understand what Smith meant when he said, “Freedom is the freedom to say two plus two is four. If that is granted, all else follows.”

It makes you wonder if the definitions fed to us about the ideals of constitutions from all around the world stand true on the face of it, or it was just another big work of few philosophers. This review is just a medium of appeal to anyone who hasn’t picked up 1984 yet, but it is on their wishlist, to give it a shot without thinking twice.

Can’t wait to read it? Buy your copy of 1984 using the link below.

Review by Jayashree Mishra .

Jayashree is 20 years old, and a student of Delhi University Political Science (Hons). She has been reading since grade 6th and like any typical teenager, her first ‘favorite’ author was Chetan Bhagat, and his book 3 Mistakes Of My Life was her first read. She considers admiring Bhagat as the first mistake in her life. She is currently more inclined towards the world of nonfiction and but Khalid Hosseini still remains her favorite.

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Nineteen eighty-four, by george orwell.

Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell is a dystopian novel written in 1948. Often a standard text in school for teenagers, 1984 is many people’s first introduction to totalitarianism. Ominously prescient in some ways, (such as the scope for surveillance to reach into our lives through the ubiquity of screens) and wide off the mark in others (Big Brother’s omnipresent, unitary police state is not a reality we live with in the West), it makes fascinating reading.

Some of Orwell’s inventions from 1984 entered the English language, like ‘Thought Police,’ ‘Big Brother’ ‘Newspeak’ and of course, the general concept of an ‘Orwellian’ society or future.

Recommendations from our site

“In terms of how technology is working in our modern surveillance powers, it’s a terrifyingly prophetic book in some of its implications for 21st-century human life. Orwell would deny that it was prophecy; he said it was a warning. But in fact, distinguished Orwell scholar Professor Peter Davis once made a list of all the things that Orwell got right, and it was a couple of fairly long paragraphs, and it was really rather terrifying.” Read more...

The Best George Orwell Books

D J Taylor , Biographer

“ Nineteen Eighty-Four is seriously read in China by intellectuals, who see similarities between the world of George Orwell and present-day China.” Read more...

The best books on Dystopia and Utopia

Chan Koonchung , Novelist

“It’s eerily predictive of the sort of video camera surveillance world that we now live in. It would be interesting to update 1984 and make all of the things that Orwell foresaw more annoying than dangerous. Well, some of them do get pretty dangerous, but things like television that looks back at you turns out to be a real pain in the ass more than an instrument of government control. We’ve come into the world of 1984 but it turns out to be 1984-Lite .” Read more...

The Best Political Satire Books

P. J. O’Rourke , Political Commentator

“None of us love Big Brother, but we all know he is part of the family. Big Brother is like the uncle we don’t like who has to be invited for Christmas. The question is: How do we live with Big Brother without him ruining our lives?” Read more...

The best books on The US Intelligence Services

Tim Weiner , Journalist

“It alerts us to the danger of unfettered state power, which under any circumstance always ends up committing violations against individuals.” Read more...

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Juan Mendez , Lawyer

“Orwellian has come to mean the kind of surveillance state we live in today, with all the CCTV. It’s not a prophetic book but it’s a warning.” Read more...

The best books on Global Security

Chris Abbott , Nonprofit Leaders & Activist

“It was originally titled 1948, but the publisher said to him that was too close. They had to push it back, so he just changed it around to 1984.” Read more...

The best books on Human Imperfection

Henry Normal , Poet

“This is the ultimate dystopia written by someone who wasn’t just one of the greatest of all journalists, but one of the most prescient…Orwell is of perennial fascination to me because…he straddles the world of investigative journalism and fiction. He also deliberately chose to experience different levels of society, which I believe is essential for a novelist interested in the truth about the way we live now. He wrote this book in 1948, when he was dying of tuberculosis, in a great burst of passionate determination, because he could see long before other people where totalitarianism and communism were heading. Animal Farm had told it as a kind of dark fairy-tale, but this was the culmination. The intellectual dishonesty of the Left, which refused to see how evil Stalin was, is despicable, and Orwell was brave enough to stand up to his friends as well as his enemies. Orwell saw the death of the dream at first-hand in Spain. He was in contact with a lot of communists, and fought on their sides against Fascism but, as Stalin’s Russia gained power, he could see this dream of equality that so many idealistic and young people have shared leaves a nightmare, just like Fascism. Anything other than democracy and truth leaves the jackboot stamping eternally into the human face, as Winston realises. His hero Winston is named, of course, after Winston Churchill” Read more...

Books that Changed the World

Amanda Craig , Journalist

“The book looks at how order and disorder co-habit. Orwell, without ever having gone to the USSR, understood it from the outside brilliantly.” Read more...

The best books on Totalitarian Russia

Robert Service , Historian

Other books by George Orwell

Down and out in paris and london by george orwell, burmese days by george orwell, a clergyman’s daughter by george orwell, keep the aspidistra flying by george orwell, the road to wigan pier by george orwell, homage to catalonia by george orwell, our most recommended books, middlemarch by george eliot, beloved by toni morrison, jane eyre by charlotte brontë, war and peace by leo tolstoy, dracula by bram stoker, the arabian nights or tales of 1001 nights.

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By George Orwell

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Reviewer directory

By George Orwell

'1984' by George Orwell follows Winston Smith, who attempts to fight back against a totalitarian Party that rules Oceania and his entire life.

In a nutshell...

' 1984 ' by George Orwell is a dystopian novel set in a totalitarian society led by the omnipresent Big Brother . The story follows Winston Smith , who works for the Ministry of Truth , altering historical records. Discontent with the regime, Winston begins a forbidden relationship with Julia . As they secretly rebel against the Party, they are eventually caught and subjected to brutal re-education. The novel ends with Winston's complete brainwashing, leading him to adore Big Brother.

Key Moments

Winston and Julia 's affair begins : Winston and Julia secretly meet and start their rebellious love affair against the Party.
O'Brien 's betrayal : O'Brien reveals himself as a loyal Party member and betrays Winston and Julia.
Room 101 torture : Winston faces his worst fear in Room 101, leading to his ultimate psychological breakdown.

Main Characters

Winston Smith : Protagonist, disillusioned Party member, seeks rebellion.
Julia : Winston's lover, anti-Party, desires personal freedom.
O'Brien : Deceptive Inner Party member, betrays Winston

Continue down for the complete summary to 1984

Totalitarian Dystopia : "1984" warns of the dangers of a totalitarian government using fear, surveillance, and propaganda to control.
Intrusive Surveillance : Big Brother symbolizes intrusive governance, showing how surveillance shapes behavior more than actual governance.
Thought Control : The Thought Police exemplify extreme privacy violations, where even thoughts are controlled, reflecting modern digital surveillance concerns.

Article written by Emma Baldwin

B.A. in English, B.F.A. in Fine Art, and B.A. in Art Histories from East Carolina University.

1984 by George Orwell opens in April of 1984. After vaguely described disastrous wars and economic collapses, the world has been divided up into continent-spanning superpowers. The novel focuses on Airstrip One , part of Oceania. The totalitarian Party rules with “ Ingsoc ”, a shortening of English Socialism. They do not tolerate opposition in any form, even negative thoughts about the Party are a crime (Thought Crime). At the center of the Party is a mysterious figurehead who goes by the name of Big Brother . He is never seen, but is omnipresent, watching citizens from their TVs, posters, and money. Big Brother is a source of fear, but also adoration. He is, as the posters state, always watching. This is a reference to the enormous amount of surveillance the party and the Thought Police utilize on every street, in every building, and in every room.

The palpable dread that Big Brother instills, a figure both revered and feared, mirrors the complex relationship we often hold with authority. Orwell ingeniously taps into this psychological conflict, exploring the dichotomy between the human desire for safety and the equally strong yearning for personal freedom.

In terms of the rising action , the protagonist of the novel, Winston Smith , is a member of the Outer Party. He has a job in the Ministry of Truth that places him at the level of an office worker. Winston is responsible for rewriting history by destroying and rewriting newspaper articles. Often this means erasing from the record those who have been disappeared by the Party (become “unpersons”) or rearranging events in order to suit a new narrative promoted by the state. Winston hates the Party and is miserable in his everyday life.

Winston is seen at the beginning of the novel with a diary he bought from Mr. Charrington , the owner of a secondhand shop. He has to hide the book whenever he writes in it so that the television ( telescreen ) can’t see it. Winston meets Julia at the Ministry of Truth and initially expects that she’s spying on him. Later, after handing him a note confessing her love for him, Julia and Winston draw close to one another. This is a serious act of treason against the party as all relationships are supposed to be conducted only for the creation of children. Julia also dislikes the party, but she’s more interested in escaping than becoming part of a revolution.

Reflecting on Winston’s secret acts of rebellion, such as his diary, strikes a poignant chord. It reminds me of the profound necessity of personal spaces and thoughts in an increasingly monitored world. Winston’s diary is not merely an act of defiance; it is an existential assertion of self in a world that seeks to deny such autonomy.

Winston also speaks with Syme , someone who is working on the creation of the newest “ Newspeak ” dictionary and is responsible for erasing words from the English language. He, Winston thinks, is too smart and is, in the end, a danger to himself.

Julia and Winston meet up for the first time in a room above Mr. Charrington’s shop. There, Winston tells Julia about his relationship, or lack thereof, with his wife Katharine .

The turning point of the novel comes over the following days, Winston notices that Syme has disappeared as Winston predicted. Winston is also approached by O’Brien , his supervisor and someone who Winston thinks is a member of the group working to overthrow the Party (The Brotherhood). O’Brien shares a book with Winston , The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism by Emmanuel Goldstein . Goldstein is one of the Party’s main enemies and the leader of a rebellion against the state. The book informs Julia and Winston about how the Party works. It inspires and confirms to Winston that the Party can be defeated if the “ proles ” or lower class, rise up.

The encounter with O’Brien and the forbidden book opens a Pandora’s box of revolutionary ideas for Winston. This moment resonates with me as a reflection on the power of ideas as weapons against oppression-a reminder that knowledge can ignite the sparks of rebellion.

We approach the climax at this point in the novel . Just when Winston is starting to think that he’s going to be able to join the fight against the Party, it is revealed that Mr. Charrington is a member of the Thought Police . He turned in Winston and Julia who are both captured and taken to the Ministry of Love. There, Winston comes into contact with other characters from the novel who have all been arrested for various reasons. O’Brien enters into the scene, revealing that he too was an agent of the state. The previous months of gaining Winston’s trust were nothing more than an elaborate way of ensnaring him.

Winston is trapped in the Ministry of Truth for a number of months. Over this period his mind is rearranged through torture and humiliation. He’s forced to confront his deepest fear in Room 101 . For Winston, this means rats. It proves to be the thing that makes Winston betray Julia.

The falling action occurs later, after he has been successfully brainwashed, he is released. Winston and Julia, who was also tortured, meet again in a park but the two longer have any interest in one another. The novel concludes with Winston celebrating the reported victory over Eurasia and reveling in his newfound love for the Party.

The resolution of the story can be seen to be the tragic end of Winston’s journey, embracing the love for Big Brother, serves as a somber meditation on the corrosive effects of totalitarianism on the human psyche. It leaves me pondering the resilience of the human spirit and the price of peace at the expense of freedom.

Step into the dystopian world of George Orwell's 1984! Are you ready to test your knowledge of Big Brother, Newspeak, and Oceania? Take the challenge now and prove your mastery of Orwell's 1984!

How does the Party control the past?

Which of the following best describes the concept of doublethink?

What is the slogan of the Party?

What is the name of the Party's leader in 1984?

What does the term "unperson" mean in the novel?

What is the purpose of the Two Minutes Hate?

What happens to Winston at the end of the novel?

What is the nature of Winston’s job at the Ministry of Truth?

Which phrase best captures the concept of "thoughtcrime"?

What does the Party claim about the state of Oceania?

Who is the supposed leader of the Brotherhood?

What is Room 101?

Who is Julia in 1984?

What does the telescreen symbolize in 1984?

What does O'Brien use to torture Winston in Room 101?

What is the official language of Oceania?

How does Winston feel when he first meets Julia?

Who betrays Winston and Julia?

What is the name of the resistance group Winston believes in?

What does "Ingsoc" stand for?

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About Emma Baldwin

Emma Baldwin, a graduate of East Carolina University, has a deep-rooted passion for literature. She serves as a key contributor to the Book Analysis team with years of experience.

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George Orwell

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