It is to be remembered that George Orwell fought for the Republicans (against Franco) in Spain towards the end of 1936. It was during this battle that Orwell was wounded. We know that George Orwell's ?Nineteen Eighty-Four' (published in 1949) publication was given this title because the novel was written in 1948. The novel was written during a muddled phase of global political unrest and on the other hand, a sense of calmness which was being weathered. Indeed it was the time when the Second World War had consummated and the downfall of Hitler's Nazi regime. It was at that time that Stalin's regime in the U.S.S.R. still deported the enemies of the Party to gulags. Further, the Cold War between the U.S.S.R and the United States of America had just triggered out. The U.S.S.R was regarded as the most totalitarian regime until Stalin's death in 1953. Orwell's work directly or indirectly criticizes totalitarianism and praises democratic socialism. This is evident as each and every line of his serious work that [he has] written since 1936 reiterates this criticism and appreciation. Considering those thoughts, it is an indisputable fact that Orwell's novel ?1984' as well as his previous political allegory on Animal Farm is both a literary masterpiece and a treatise on politics and totalitarianism.
[...] In the terms of this analysis, it appears that, if Orwell draws in 1984 a gripping political picture of totalitarian future, he also uses his talent, both in content and style, to make this picture a work of art, therefore likely to affect a vast audience. Strongly criticising Nazi and Communist totalitarianisms, Orwell will contribute to avoid the reproduction of our past errors. The novel, however, is not to be taken as a simple condemnation of Stalin's and Hitler's atrocities being a very original book, both by its remarkable cynicism and by the intensity of its plot, including Winston's love and final betrayal to Julia. [...]
[...] There's nothing those swine don't have, nothing'). Both for Goldstein and Orwell, collectivism does not lead to socialism. The masses (‘proles') are given freedom of thought, because they don't think at all: ‘Proles and animals are free' On the contrary, a Party member is not allowed the slightest deviation of thought and there is an elaborate mental training to ensure this, a training that can be summarised in the complex concept of ‘doublethink'. It is also worth noticing that the novel contains many similarities with Stalin's communist regime. [...]
[...] As a final point, Orwell really succeeds in creating an atmosphere of suspense and tension throughout the whole book (the reader is quite shocked when learning that Mr. Charrington is actually a member of the Thought Police – ‘It occurred to Winston that for the first time in his life he was looking, with knowledge, at a member of the Thought police'), the climax being nevertheless the final hopeless sentence ‘He loved Big Brother'. Short, easy and powerful, it haunts the reader even after he closed the book: is totalitarianism our fate? Will Winston's world become our future? [...]
[...] With Newspeak, ‘Doublethink' will be even easier and unorthodoxy will completely disappear. In brief, many crimes and errors will be beyond of the power to commit, simply because they are now nameless and consequently unimaginable. To summarise, when Oldspeak has been once and for all superseded, the last link with the past will have been severed. I also believe that Orwell's genius is mainly to express in a few words very complex ideas: ‘The command of the old despotisms was Thou shalt not. [...]
[...] 1984's originality is indeed the fact it makes a large audience take an interest in deep political problems, because the book is as attractive as a work of art. Thus, Orwell does not hesitate to exaggerate some aspects of his novel, often playing on irony (‘The capitalists were fat, ugly men with wicked face ') and using specific stylistic processes (such as the simile ‘sheep-face'), in order to shock his reader ‘Did I ever tell you [ ] about the time when those two nippers of mine set fire to the old market-woman's skirt because they saw her wrapping up sausages in a poster of B.B.? [...]
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