OWELL
George Orwell 1984
Eerie parallels with today's online economy of words and knowledge
George Orwell's dystopian novel 1984 functions as a satire of many of the excesses of 20th century communism, such as everyday citizens' communal, monotonous lives, its nonsensical wars to keep the people complacent, and the creation of 'Big Lies' that are accepted, simply because the government so totally dominates the media. A symptom of this totalitarian thinking is manifested in the way in which language is used throughout the novel, through the use of slogans like "war is peace," "freedom is slavery" and "ignorance is strength." Even the ministry which plans the war is known as the Ministry of Peace; the ministry which engineers the propaganda disseminated throughout the society is the Ministry of Truth. So long as you call something the 'right' name it doesn't matter what the ministry actually does.
Orwell suggests that by controlling and manipulating language,…...
mlaReferences
Orwell, George. (1950). 1984. Signet Classics.
Orwell, George. (1946). Politics and the English language. Retrieved:
But that's where we are now. 'e have to look at this operation very carefully and maybe it shouldn't be allowed to go ahead at all'" (Nat Hentoff, p.A19).
Today we find our system of government to claim that they are the only people who know the difference between right and wrong and thus while the entire world should disarm themselves of nuclear warheads, we should keep them. Our government went into Iraq for war even when the United Nations was against it. This was because they claimed to know what was right and rejected the decision of the United Nations. These are very similar to what is described in 1984 and such factors makes one think about what the future will be like. hile it may seem that we are headed in the right direction, because people feel that they are given the freedom of speech and thought and…...
mlaWorks Cited
1) George Lenczowski. "Ideology and Power in the Middle East: Studies in Honor of George Lenczowski." Durham, NC: Duke University Press (1988): 22.
2) John David Frodsham. "The New Barbarians: Totalitarianism, Terror and the Left Intelligentsia in Orwell's 1984." World Affairs 147.3 (1984): 139.
3) David Goodman. "Orwell's 1984: The Future Is Here George Orwell Believed the Stark Totalitarian Society He Described in 1984 Actually Would Arrive by the Year 2000, Thanks to the Slow, Sinister Influence of Socialism." Insight on the News 17.49 (2001): 22.
4) Jackson Thoreau. "Under Bush, the Poor Get Poorer." [Online website] Available at on: 28/11/2005]http://www.democraticunderground.com/articles/03/09/26_poor.html [Accessed
George Orwell wrote "Homage to Catalonia" about his time spent as a soldier for POUM, the Worker's Party of Marxist Unity, during the Spanish Civil War. His vision of war was certainly different going in than it ended up being after he had spent several months on the front line. Perhaps the most disheartening aspect of the war (besides the cold) for him was the political conflicts that were undermining the overall efforts of those who were against Franco. Suppose Orwell wrote about his experiences without bringing in the very confusing different political agendas - would the message of "Homage to Catalonia" still be the same? Hardly - even Orwell himself said that it would "be impossible to write about the Spanish war from a purely military angle. It was above all things a political war." (46) Yet in spite of Orwell's disgust at the conflict among those who were…...
mlaBibliography
Orwell, George. "Homage to Catalonia." New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co. 1952. 232 pages.
George Orwell's last novel, 1984, was released in 1949. The world was still reeling from the effects of orld ar II and the Soviet Union was emerging as the next great threat to world security. That same year, the estern world watched as the Soviet Union exploded the first atomic bomb, sparking forty years of the Cold ar. Supporters of capitalism and democracy quickly hailed the book as a warning about the dangers of totalitarian and Communist regimes.
Orwell himself was born in India in 1903, the son of a British official. His real name was Eric Blair. At the age of 2, he returned to England with his mother and older sister. The Blair family then put together money to send Orwell to an expensive private school for his early education.
A bright student, Orwell gained scholarships to the exclusive ellington and Eton Colleges. Partly because of his middle-class background and…...
mlaWorks Cited
Bloom, Harold. George Orwell. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 1988.
Orwell, George. "Letter to Francis Henson." In Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell. Sonia Orwell and Ian Angus, ed. New York: Harcourt Brace Janovich, 1968.
Orwell, George. 1984. New York: New American Library, 1976.
In Animal Farm, Orwell more directly satirizes real world events, as the overthrow of a farmer by his animals and the progression of the new order established there to a totalitarian dictatorship closely mirrors that of Russia's sudden transition to Communism and Stalin's iron-fisted rule. hereas 1984 drops the reader immediately into the world of a government gone wrong, Animal Farm shows the emergence of such a government. Things begin happily once the farmer has been chased off, the animals all pitch in to accomplish the necessary work and "every mouthful of food was an acute positive pleasure, now that it was truly their own food, produced by themselves and for themselves" (Chapter III, par. 3). But eventually one of the pigs -- the species that had started the revolution -- wrests power from the other by having him driven off, and things on the farm enter a steady decline…...
mlaWorks Cited
Orwell, George. Animal Farm. 1945. Accessed online 30 September 2009. http://www.george-orwell.org/Animal_Farm/index.html
Orwell, George. 1984. 1949. Accessed online 30 September 2009. http://www.george-orwell.org/1984 /index.html
Orwell
Discussion on George Orwell
Eric Arthur Blair, who is better remembered by his pen name, George Orwell, was one of the most influential authors of the twentieth century. He is one of the few modern day individuals who has fostered the creation of a new word -- "Orwellian." This word itself could be the subject of an entire book with many modern day examples. This has led many people to believe that much of Orwell's work was prophetic in nature; giving insights as to what individuals might expect in one possible future for humanity.
Just to illustrate the importance of the term Orwellian that has perpetrated the modern vernacular, a few examples will be provided. One example of a rather Orwellian term that actually predates Orwell himself is the concept of civil war. If the contradiction doesn't appear immediately, just reflect on any war that you were aware of that was truly…...
In 1984, this idea is demonstrated with Thought Police. It is certainly bad enough to never feel alone in one's own community but it even worse to never feel alone in one's own head. This idea is maddening, as Orwell illustrates through inston. He says, "At home and in bed in the darkness you were safe from the telescreen so long as you kept silent" (96-7). Here we see that inston can only find time to think his own thoughts when the Party believes he is asleep. There is nothing more controlling than making people think they have no time to themselves and anything they think outside the permission of the Party is evil and wrong. This keeps people obeying the law because it is safe and comfortable there. If people do not make any trouble, they will not get any trouble. Malcolm Pittock agrees adding the Party does…...
mlaWorks Cited
Orwell, George. 1984. New York: Harcourt Brace. 1977.
McGiveron, Rafeeq. "Huxley's Brave New World." EBSCO Resource Database. Site Accessed
April 23, 2010.
Pittock, Malcolm. "The Hell of Nineteen Eighty-Four." GALE Resources Database. Site Accessed April 23, 2010.
Thomas Paine in his essay The ights of Man suggests that the morality of an issue is based on the equality of an issue. For the existence of all men should be seen as equal. The Monarchy and imperial ways detracts from the equality of mankind and creates a suggestive loophole which gives the rights of man to a select few and thus creates an imbalance. The imbalance can be religious, legal, racial or social. Paine believed that only with equality would there be any sort of justice and morality for in every other case there would be a perception of morals but in fact it would be simple injustice. His view of Monarchy can be read through the words, "What is called monarchy always appears to me a silly contemptible thing. I compare it to something kept behind a curtain, about which there is a great deal of bustle…...
mlaReferences:
1. Paine, Thomas The Rights of Man, 1972 accessed http://www.constitution.org/tp/rightsman_pre.htm
2. Orwell, George Shooting an Elephant, 2003 accessed http://www.george-orwell.org/Shooting_an_Elephant/0.html
3. Wills, Garry Inventing America, Jefferson's Declaration of Independence, Vintage Books, (1979)pp. 326-27
In other words, Orwell's fictional government wanted the citizens to know what the government felt would be good for them to know, not what people really truly needed to know (i.e., the truth).
As to the Bush Administration's censoring science to spare the public from hearing the real facts, the Christian Science Monitor reported that the hite House "has broadly attempted to control which climate scientists could speak with reporters, as well as editing scientists' congressional testimony on climate change..." (Clayton, 2007). The Bush Administration was "particularly active in stifling [scientists'] discussion of the link between increased hurricane intensity and global warming," the article reports.
In the novel, the Ministry of Truth tweaked photographs in order to present a false image to the public. And inston at one point invented a person named Comrade Ogilvy who displayed great heroism and gave his life for his country. That was a lie but…...
mlaWorks Cited
Clayton, Mark. "Study finds White House manipulation on climate science." The Christian Science Monitor 12 December, 2007.
Kurtz, Howard. "Education Department Used Williams to Promote 'No Child' Law."
The Washington Post 8 January 2005.
Orwell, George. Nineteen Eighty-Four. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1949.
Orwell's government had as its primary goal the control of the people in order to gain more power. This, rather than good rulership for the happiness of the people, was their ultimate goal. In the same way, ideologies such as Nazism and Communism became extreme to the point where they defeated their purpose of an ideal society. Those who suffered under these totalitarian regimes did not consider themselves to live in an ideal society. Winston Smith was also disillusioned with the type of ideology offered by the Brotherhood and the Party.
One of the prominent elements in totalitarian societies is the resistance. This emerges from those who will not be repressed, even by the extreme tactics of the government. In the novel, this sector is referred to as "the Brotherhood." Winston longs to join them in their effort to overthrow the government. The problem is however that their secrecy extends to…...
mlaReferences
Orwell, George. 1984. Retrieved from http://www.george-orwell.org/1984
Leigh, Allen. 2010. Big Brother. Retrieved from http://www.bigbrothergovernment.org/
Lowe, Peter. 2009. Englishness in a Time of Crisis: George Orwell, John Betjeman, an the Second World War. Cambridge Quarterly. Vol. 38, No. 3. pp. 243-263.
ORELL
George Orwell
Orwell's Idealism
In my interpretation of George Orwell's writings the overall ideology that informs his work emphasizes the power of language. In his time there was a lot of political upheaval and he was very concerned with writers and their abuse of the power their language contained and how that power affected readers. Though he doesn't express this concern outright its evident in his criticism's of the perversions of language that writers in the fields of politics, sociology and mass media were guilty of. In "Politics and the English Language" for example, Orwell writes that, "The writer either has a meaning and cannot express it, or he inadvertently says something else, or he is almost indifferent as to whether his words mean anything or not," as if conscientious and deliberate use of language would somehow correct the political corruption of his time (p. 2). He clearly accuses politically motivated writers…...
mlaWorks Cited
Orwell, George. A Collection of Essays by George Orwell. Orlando, FL: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1970. Book.
The Party preferred that people use the services of the prostitutes rather than have a satisfying sexual life with a partner. Procreation was the only purpose for sex.
inston thinks that the proles alone have the ability to change life. They make up such a great deal of the population of Oceania and have been able to hold on to their emotions and some semblance of life without Big Brother watching every moment. He is discouraged about the chances of that happening as he writes of the proles, "until they become conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious" (Orwell, 74). Although they have the strength in numbers and have the options of loving each other, having children and not being watched every single moment, they have not attempted to stage an uprising against the party. The few at the top control all…...
mlaWorks Cited
Orwell, George. 1984. New York: Signet Classic, 1949.
George Orwell book Nineteen Eighty-Four by pointing out salient themes in the book and using updated political examples to show that Orwell was not necessarily writing science fiction but in fact he was commenting on contemporary times in his life. Orwell was reacting in part to the fascism / fanaticism of Nazi Germany, the repressive policies of the Soviet Union, and the loss of privacy and freedom due to the repression he saw and despised. This book, while seemingly extreme in its depiction of a fascist state, is chilling in its detail and not that far from reality when totalitarian states are taken into consideration. This is brilliant fiction that is based on factual events in the author's life. Many of the scenes, while blatantly anti-democratic, are not that far from the loss of privacy and the censorship that exist in America and elsewhere in recent times.
ONE: 2 central…...
mlaWorks Cited
Drabinski, Emily. (2006). Librarians and the Patriot Act. Radical Teacher, Issue 77, 12-14.
Greenberg, Dan. (2004). New report accuses Bush of suppressing research data. Lancet,
363(9412), 874-874.
Orwell, George. (1949). 1984. Orlando, FL: Signet Classics.
So, the reader of this essay was set up by Orwell perfectly: blast away at the stinking rotting, drunken social scene in Paris, frequented in large part by Americans pretending to have talent, and mention that Miller thought this was cool to write about. Then bring in the terrible, frightening and bloody realities happening elsewhere in Europe, and you have shown what a rascal Miller was.
But wait, Orwell admits that novelists don't always have to write about "contemporary history" and yet he adds, and this is classic Orwell in his political suit of clothes, that a novelist that "simply disregards the major public events of the moment is generally either a footler or a plain idiot." ow! Miller is a plain idiot for writing that trashy novel that was a best seller? You have to love Orwell's candor and plainspoken narrative. There can be no doubt where he stands.
ells,…...
mlaWorks Cited
Bloom, Harold. George Orwell. New York: Infobase Publishing, 2007.
Orwell, George. "Criticism of Tropic of Cancer." Inside the Whale. The Collected Essays,
Journalism and Letters of George Orwell: An Age Like This, 1920-1940. Harcourt Brace
Jovanovich, 1968. 493-502.
Accuracy of George Orwell's Predictions
George Orwell chose a specific date, 1984, for the title of his novel predicting the evolution of society by that date. However we are now 18 years past that date and his predictions have not come true. How could Orwell have been so wrong? Or was he only wrong about the exact timing and still correct about his general predictions? To understand Orwell's view of the future, it is necessary to put Orwell's work in the context of contemporary events just after the conclusion of World War II. His lifetime only spanned the first half of the twentieth century, a period of tremendous conflict, particularly in the "civilized world" of Orwell's experience. Much of the conflict occurred in Europe and impacted the United Kingdom dramatically. The power vacuum resulting at the end of World War II allowed the growth of totalitarian regimes in the oviet…...
mlaSources
Bloom, Harold. "George Orwell." New York: Chelsea House, 1987.
Davis, Robert Gorham. "Ten Masters of the Modern Essay: Forster, Lawrence, Huxley, Orwell, Auden, McCarthy, Baldwin, and Gold." New York: Harcourt, Brace, & World, 1966.
Gross, Miriam. "The World of George Orwell." New York: Simon and Schuster, 1972.
Orwell, George. "The Collected Essays, Journalism, and Letters of George Orwell." New York: Harcourt, Brace, & World, 1968.
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2. Discuss the significance of the characters Napoleon and Snowball in the novel Animal Farm.
3. Analyze the role of propaganda in Animal Farm and how it is used to manipulate the animals.
4. Investigate the theme of loyalty and betrayal in Animal Farm.
5. Compare and contrast the leaders in Animal Farm with historical figures or political leaders.
6. Examine the role of technology and innovation in Animal Farm and how it contributes to the animals' rebellion.
7. Discuss the role of language and communication in Animal Farm and how it influences the animals'....
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