6. Newspeak Diction!

1984 is set in Oceania. In Oceania the official language is called 'newspeak' (read new-speak) is an excellent example of diction. The party does a good job of controlling people's minds. One of the ways they do this is by breaking down their vocabulary. Newspeak can be somewhat understood by the layman (reader) which is what makes it interesting. Part of the way it works is by eliminating as many words as possible. Not only can all synonyms be taken away but all antonyms as well. For example, there is no need for the word "bad" when "ungood" works just as well, and for things that are worse than "ungood" things "plusungood" or "doubleplusungood" would suffice. This, in conjunction with the mind control already in place "Who controls the past, controls the future. Who controls the present, controls the past" (Orwell, 35) is part of controlling the present and the way the people of Oceania think about things. By creating a whole new language, they can take out words like "rebellion" so no one even knows what that means.

5. Significance

1984 - George Orwell

1. The Diary
2. The shop he bought it at

     The diary is the outlet that allows Winston to rebel. His life, as well as most other people's life, is consumed by conformity. The diary allows for progression in the book. It starts Winston on his journey to revolution. Winston has conformed his entire life. The purchasing of the diary, is his first thought crime, he intends to write in it! What a novel idea! He firsts writes a entry which is mostly nonsense, however the next time he sits down he writes "DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER" (Orwell, 48) over and over. This does not entail death for Winston, this IS death. Now Winston has nothing to lose. He has already committed the worst crime one can commit!

     The shop he bought the book at is a place that sells antiques. In Oceania the past is completely controlled. A place that sells relics of the past is quite the thing to exist in such a place. To me, something seems off about it. Winston must have been seen with the diary coming out of the shop. Perhaps there is some way in which the shop will be used as a way to find Winston. Winston will be figured out eventually and the shop's existence doesn't make any sense.

4. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) attributes

"He did not know what had made him pour out this stream of rubbish. But the curious thing was that while he was doing so a totally different memory had clarified itself in his mind, to the point where he almost felt equal to writing it down." (Orwell, Part 1 Chapter 1)


     The attribute I selected was courage. Prior to the quote I selected, Winston had written an entry about the world they live in. This may not seem like, but within the context it is quite couragous. The dystopian world is one in which everyone is under constant surveillance. Or at the very least, as Winston mentions, it's safe to assume you are always being watched, because it almost always true.

   In the story Just Lather That's All Captain Torres shows a great example of courage. Throughout the story Torres has seemed to unwittingly put himself in grave danger. But what he says at the end tells us otherwise. "They told me that you'd kill me. I came to find out. But killing ain't easy. You can take my word for it." (Tellez). So we learn that in fact Captain Torres has walked in to the barber shop knowing full well that he could be killed. This means that he wasn't unwittingly walking in on danger, but courageously challenging the barber. 

"The ideal set up by the Party was something huge, terrible, and glittering—a world of steel and concrete, of monstrous machines and terrifying weapons—a nation of warriors and fanatics, marching forward in perfect unity, all thinking the same thoughts and shouting the same slogans, perpetually working, fighting, triumphing, persecuting—three hundred million people all with the same face." (Orwell, 77)
What we see from this quote is what the Party (the controlling power) values. Such values, if went against, would have severe consequences. So even writing your thoughts down would get you vaporized. 










     Tellez, Hernando. "Just Lather, That's All."redirecting your request. N.p., n.d. Web. 7 Apr. 2013. http://www2.ups.edu/faculty/velez/LAS100/tellez.htm

3. Define and Describe

The theme of justice in 1984 is quite different from what I think (or at least hope) most people would have. The way justice is portrayed by the government in this novel is a bleak picture.  Justice, one might say, doesn't exist in 1984. Well, at least as most people might consider to be justice. Big Brother and the (ironically named) Ministry of Truth controls everything that happens in the fictional world of 1984.      The way this is presented is made very clear by the Ministry of Truth's slogan "WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY, IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH" (Orwell, 17). This slogan, is plastered everywhere. Along with the image of Big Brother that says "Big Brother is always watching"(19). The book is written in third person limited, which I think is the best way to portray the world in this book. The reason I think this is because you feel exactly like Winston. You have no idea what is going on with The Ministry, or the Party, all you know is that it is the controlling power which feeds people lies. So by not using say, third person omniscient, we get a better sense of what is ACTUALLY going on in the book.      The plot in this book has told me about the perception of justice by the excitement of activities that really should not be excited. Writing in a book about how you hate the government is something that plenty of "teenage anarchists" do, but while I was reading Winston right "DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER"(18) I was on the edge of my seat. After he opened the door and the book was sitting open on the table the feeling I had was similar to watching a WWII movie where someone was hiding Jews and there are Nazis at the door. All these (usually mundane) things were intense because of the warped perception of justice.

2. Identification

Identifying Elements of a Novel

I am reading 1984 and four of the main elements i have noticed so far are:

1. Conflict

2. Suspense 

3. Theme

4. Setting

      The setting of this book is in a dystopian wasteland. In the book we follow the main character Winston. Who understands that at every moment, of every day, he is being watched. The picture Winston paints of the place he lives is quite grim. On the first page Winston sees a poster (which, I should mention, are everywhere in 1984) that really sets the scene (or at least the feeling of it. "It was one of those pictures which are so contrived that the eyes follow you about when you move. BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU, the caption beneath it ran." (Orwell, 1948)

     Conflict in this book is constant, apart from the conflict between man and the government (one might consider that to be man vs. man or man vs nature) there is a more subtle man vs. self conflict going on with Winston. In 1984 Winston is battling himself during the two minutes of hate. The whole point of the two minutes of hate is to get everyone that watches (which would be every person under big brothers control) to stand up and yell and scream and get very angry. During this time Winston has an internal battle as to whether or not to give in (he does in the end). Another internal battle he has with himself is before he writes in his journal. He was afraid to even buy the blank book in fear that he would get arrested for owning it (which says something about the setting).


     The theme in 1984 is centered around rebellion and revolution. Winston lives in a totalitarian world where Big Brother is the slave master. In the first couple of chapters, Winston commits a number of thought-crimes against Big Brother. One of these include writing in his journal "DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER" (19) over and over in his journal. Although whether he wrote it in his journal or not was irrelevant, because "The Thought Police would get him just the same" (19). This concept of 'thought crime' being one of the worst things one could do in 1984 helps to acknowledge the theme of revolution every time Winston writes in his dairy, or thinks about joining the rebels. What might be considered mundane today is unnerving in 1984 due to the constant monitoring of everything.

     The over-watch of Big Brother and The Ministry of Truth is the entire basis for the suspense so far in 1984. As touched on above, fairly non-eventful things (like writing about a distaste for something in a diary) become very suspenseful. In context of the book, expressing anything but total and complete adoration for Big Brother is not only considered to be punishable by death, but it is death. So Winston's 'petty' rebellion is actually extremely dangerous for himself, and this is what creates suspense.

1. Important Book Elements

Elements Of A Book That Matter To Me

I read a lot of different stuff, but for narratives, there are a couple things that, for me, make a book a lot lighter on the eyes.

1. Engaging - There is not a whole lot I like less than a boring book. For the first couple chapters of The Hobbit I was ready to claw my eyes out but after that I couldn't put it down. Sometimes books are boring to start because you can feel bogged down with information, however this gives the book more depth later on. This makes it much easier to connect and sympathize with the characters because you feel like you know them.

2. Another thing is run-on sentences, a book (or any piece of writing for that matter) should never have any run-on sentences, it's almost as if when I read them, I get out of breath, and I have to take a little breath in my head, it 's really no fun and as the sentence runs on longer, and longer I feel like the author is speeding up as they say it, essentially what I'm saying is that it really ruins that part of the book for me.

3. Appropriate choice of language - a book that is set in a victorian time period, should be written with Victorian english. This really helps me get into a book because everything feels so... appropriate. Furthermore, there is something to be said about profanity. I mean, I don't want want to read about Huckleberry Finn's "African-American friend"