george orwell's "1984" is on flavorpill's "30 to read before 30" and since i am two months away, i decided i need to crack down on my reading. so i picked up a copy of "1984" at the library. and before i go on, how great is this cover?!?! there was a paperback version i could have checked out but after i saw this cover, i had to read this one.
i guess i should clarify, this was my first reading of "1984". i never read it in high school, it wasn't assigned to us. my sister read it in college and i remember borrowing her copy to read but could never get into it. i tried twice. and thanks to apple and cbs, i knew about "big brother is watching" so was okay on the pop culture front. but in order to get its literary significance i needed to read it.
this book is always noted as a revolutionary novel and it is especially considering the time it was published. i remember checking the publishing year and surprised to find it was 1949. to question and portray governments in such a manner had to be shocking. however, as interesting as the concept of this novel is, i still became bored with it, there were points were i was like, get on with the story already.
let me clarify, i was not bored by the segments on oceania but by some of the story plots. i loved learning about the society of "1984" and how it worked. being a history major, it was interesting to see how the world we know could develop into oceania. for example, i believe that war has become more of a means of economic growth than anything else. just like in the novel, the boundaries for our countries are set, which is why we now fight for concepts like democracy and freedom and against terrorism and islam, fighting wars that truly do not have a means. i know we captured osama bin laden, but are we still at war with afghanistan? honestly, i do not know. can someone clarify this for me? my confusion is also an example of how majority of the united states is now like the "proles" when it comes to being informed about the war. we know nothing other than we need to support it and we have an enemy. also the switching back and forth between the enemies in the novel, foreshadowed what happen with the us and 9/11. i was always confused as to who our patriotism and nationalism was supposed to be directed against because i thought it was al-queida and then all of sudden, saddam hussein and iraq were targeted as enemies. another thing from the novel that reminded me of 9/11 was the labelling of things like "victory" gin or "victory" cigarettes, just like we had our "freedom" fries. and though we did not have "hate week" or "two minute hate" after 9/11, i did feel this odd peer pressure to demonstrated my patriotism via a flag. remember how everyone had flags on their cars and it was unamerican not to have one? it's scary to think of how simlilar the world was post-9/11 to "1984".
another way our world is similar to "1984" is the news and stastistics. part of winston's job was to change the figures that big brother had projected in terms of production so that production was recorded as over what bb had predicted. in the novel, winston pondered how these numbers were all arbitrary. first of all, a prediction is a prediction so if it was not accurate that is fine. why go through the point of lying especially since people know that production is low because whatever was being produced was scarce. this reminded me of our news and the stastiscs it spews at us especially in terms of health. there is always some study that shows this or that but in real life, disease strikes whoever. there is j real means of preventing things. i mean explain ozzy osborne, with how he treated his body, yet he is still alive and kicking. stastiscs are just a means of manipulating society.
last but not least, i am worried that history would be lost like in "1984". not so much because it is being rewritten but because it is not being taught. i recently subbed for a fifth grade class and they only worked on social studies for 15 minutes. i worry that the youth today do not understand the importance of history. because as orwell wrote and zach de la rocha from rage against the machine sang "who controls the past, controls the future: who controls the present controls the past", so if they learn nothing, they will control nothing.
this is all praise but there were also aspects of the story that i did not enjoy. for one thing i did not like julia. it just seemed so random that her character feel in love with winston. i thought she was part of the thought police and was going to betray him. (also the fact that the shopkeeper was a thought police totally took me by surprise though in the back of my mind, i wondered how his shop was still in existence). once i figured out she wasn't, i didn't care for her character. she wasn't a rebel because of any inner longing for a better life like winston, she was a rebel just to be against the system. i hate to get all women's lib but i felt julia was an unjustly portrayal of women in revolutionary movements. julia was not fully committed to the ideologies against the party and her primary act of resistance was sex. and i am all for women gaining liberation via fulfilling their sexual appetites versus following societies virtues. however, julia demonstrated no intelligence or knowledge when it came to protest against the current system, she often became bored by what winston had to share. she even feel asleep during his reading of the book. it just seemed like a copout to make her so shallow once the real revolting started especially since she was smart enough to get goods like real coffee and sugar and had came up with routes for them to meet. and sadly throughout history women's roles in revolutions sadly get reduced down to their sexual experiences.
since we are on the topic of sex, i was shocked by how much sex was discussed in the novel. and wonder how high schools that teach this present this. or is "1984" one of those banned books? and the sex is why "1984" is banned. anyway, i found it interesting how sex is a means of control. the party takes away the sensuality of sex and turns it into a duty. i know i have discussed it before but i really feel that being raised mormon, the emphasis on purity and chastity resulted in my obedience as teen. i was so focused on being pure, i didn't date in high school. i am not saying that as a teen one should have sex. i am just saying that for me, my abstinence from sex may have been a reason for my obedience as a teen.
also i did not buy that winston was so naive about o'brien. i thought it was too convenient how it all came together. it seemed too easy to become apart of the brotherhood and felt like a trap. but i guess winston was so hopefully that he was too gullible.
last but not least i did not like the ending. i was hoping the human spirit would have prevailed. i didn't expect winston to spark a revolution but i didn't want him to give in. it was also pathetic that he gave in because of rats. i would hope that the human spirit would have been stronger. it was heartbreaking to see all hope lost. i would have been happier with winston committing suicide versus loving big brother.
i enjoyed the appendix on newspeak. it is interesting to think of how important vocabulary is in terms of expressing our views. it is also interesting to think
how lack of a vocabulary restricts our thinking. the focus on language also demonstrated how important it is to read and expand our vocabulary. it is true with my recent reading of classics, i have been about to better expressed my view of the world by using literary examples. so let this be a lesson!
after reading all of that analysis, you are probably wondering, but you said you got bored. i did simply because though
"1984" raises important questions about politics, war, government, and history for someone that is already skeptical about their government it doesn't present anything new. i was a history major and so many of the trends discussed were not new for me. however if i had read this book while in high school or during college, it would have blown my mind. so i guess instead of being a book one reads before they are 30, it actually before 25.
last but not least at the lacma, while looking at the bcam elevator, i was able to imagine what it would like to have big brother watching:
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