Nineteen Eighty-Four - George Orwell Heard of this :- Big Brother is watching you. ? This is the central theme of 1984.
Orwell is famous for his anti-Stalin views. He was pro-Trotsky. To be frank, I have no clear idea of what makes Stalin different from Trotsky. What I understand is that Trotsky was amore of a puritan where as Stalin was more practical. Had Trotsky been in power, I feel he also would have ended into the same mode that Stalin adapted. May be less brutal.
Orwell has written this book in 1948. The book's original name was "The last Man in Europe", but later on was changed to 1984 according to the suggetion of his publisher. Well, I prefer the discarded title ;)
World has only three super powers, accrding to the story, which are Eurasia, Oceania and Eastasia. All these are in war with one another all the time. Winston is a native of Oceania. Rather he is an outer party member of Oceania.
The story is a mockery of the Totalitarian concept of Stalin. I am not sure if Stalin was a totalitarian in its true sense. But that had been a favorite theme for Orwell. Animal Farm is a better mockery of it.
1984 takes a little patience to read through. And ofcourse, a background understanding of Totalitarian theory and democratic-socialism. The most notable thing is that, even though
Orwell had been dilly-dallying all his life in choosing a perfect philosophy or theory, he had always been a socialist. He turned anti-imperialist in the begining of his career and was
a true socialist all his life. Though the doctrines he chose varied considerably over time.
Oceania is a country ruled by "The Party". Everything is determined by the party. They control past, present and future. They control your food, sleep, work and even sex. Winston, our protagonist happens to be the last living man. Rest are all transformed to "comrades".
Orwell's imagination is marvellous. Even if we assume that his severe hatred and contempt for Stalin gave him the central theme of the story, there is one thing that amuses me. Winston get to read an anti-party propaganda called "The Book". Orwell actually has written another book inside 1984 as "The Book". I have to admit that I was almost convinced that War Is Peace.
Here is the abstract of "The Book"
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But it was also clear that an all-round increase in wealth threatened the destruction—indeed, in some sense was the destruction—of a hierarchical society. In a world in which everyone worked short hours, had enough to eat, lived in a house with a bathroom and a refrigerator, and possessed a motor-car or even an aeroplane, the most obvious and perhaps the most important form of inequality would already have disappeared. If it once became general, wealth would confer no distinction. It was possible, no doubt, to imagine a society in which WEALTH, in the sense of personal possessions and luxuries, should be evenly distributed, while POWER remained in the hands of a small privileged caste. But in practice such a society could not long remain stable. For if leisure and security were enjoyed by all alike, the great mass of human beings who are normally stupefied by poverty would become literate and would learn to think for themselves; and when once they had done this, they would sooner or later realize that the privileged minority had no function, and they would sweep it away. In the long run, a hierarchical society was only possible on a basis of poverty and ignorance. To return to the agricultural past, as some thinkers about the beginning of the twentieth century dreamed of doing, was not a practicable solution. It conflicted with the tendency towards mechanization which had become quasi-instinctive throughout almost the whole world, and moreover, any country which remained industrially backward was helpless in a military sense and was bound to be dominated, directly or indirectly, by its more advanced rivals.
Nor was it a satisfactory solution to keep the masses in poverty by restricting the output of goods. This happened to a great extent during the final phase of capitalism, roughly between 1920 and 1940. The economy of many countries was allowed to stagnate, land went out of cultivation, capital equipment was not added to, great blocks of the population were prevented from working and kept half alive by State charity. But this, too, entailed military weakness, and since the privations it inflicted were obviously unnecessary, it made opposition inevitable. The problem was how to keep the wheels of industry turning without increasing the real wealth of the world. Goods must be produced, but they must not be distributed. And in practice the only way of achieving this was by continuous warfare.
The essential act of war is destruction, not necessarily of human lives, but of the products of human labour. War is a way of shattering to pieces, or pouring into the stratosphere, or sinking in the depths of the sea, materials which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable, and hence, in the long run, too intelligent. Even when weapons of war are not actually destroyed, their manufacture is still a convenient way of expending labour power without producing anything that can be consumed. A Floating Fortress, for example, has locked up in it the labour that would build several hundred cargo-ships. Ultimately it is scrapped as obsolete, never having brought any material benefit to anybody, and with further enormous labours another Floating Fortress is built. In principle the war effort is always so planned as to eat up any surplus that might exist after meeting the bare needs of the population. In practice the needs of the population are always underestimated, with the result that there is a chronic shortage of half the necessities of life; but this is looked on as an advantage. It is deliberate policy to keep even the favoured groups somewhere near the brink of hardship, because a general state of scarcity increases the importance of small privileges and thus magnifies the distinction between one group and another.
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He wrote awesme and for a cause he truly beleived in. A good read, though it took a good amount of time. Still, if you are new to Orwell, pick up Animal Farm first. And ya, don't forget to google out information about the Stalin-Trotsky-Orwell love tirangle. Happy reading !!!!!!!!!!!!!
