1984' Book Review: Anomalies and Paradoxes of Human Behaviour

Through the representation of individual and collective human experiences, composers are able to challenge our assumptions on the complexity of human behaviour. Through the '1984' book review essay we cam analyse the anomalies and paradoxes of human behaviour that are revealed in Orwell's novel.

These paradoxes are mostly revealed through the protagonist, Winston Smith, as he experiences life under an oppressive totalitarian government that suppresses the traits that make us human. Through the story we explore individuals’ inner struggle on whether to conform to society standards or to rebel to maintain their freedom and individuality. This statement is explored In George Orwell’s novel 1984 which reflects the impact of oppressive governments as readers become aware of the collective struggle in overcoming conformity to establish individualism as the qualities and emotions of human beings are revealed which add to the complexity of the human experience. Paradoxically despite our desire for individuality it is harder for individuals to not conform than it is to conform and this is reflected through the masses in 1984 and eventually even for the heroic protagonist, Winston.

To control an individual’s thoughts and actions is to manipulate their emotions. George Orwell’s 1984 novel is set in a dystopic state where a totalitarian one-party systems control all aspects of society and the thoughts of its citizens. While reflective of such States as the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany, Orwell portrays any society where government implements excessive control in which the actions and thoughts of individuals are strictly regulated. Through the character Winston Smith, Orwell creates an individual representative of the last man of the world and as the heroic protagonist who struggles to maintain his own thoughts. Winston is conscious of the party’s repressive control and questions his own devotion to the party, yet even he is vulnerable to control of the emotions indicated during the two minutes hate period where Winston’s metaphoric description of a “hideous ecstasy of fear” sweeping through the mob, “like an electric current”, where the high modality of its impact, “it was impossible to avoid joining in” results in his secret “loathing” of Big Brother to “adoration”. Though temporary for the rebellious Winston, the juxtaposition of Winston’s feelings emphasise how controlling an individual’s emotions – albeit through playing on their fears -can control their thinking. Winston’s battle to maintain his thinking shown in writing down of his true thoughts repeatedly, ‘down with Big Brother’ with fervour, symbolise an individual’s natural inclination to independent thought. However, the impact of emotions on individuals thinking is furthered through contrast in Winston’s thinking after falling in love with Julia, “the risk of taking minor risks suddenly seemed stupid.” Simultaneously, this anomaly in Winston’s usually rebellious attitude depicts that anomalies in human behaviour are attributable to personal motivation or emotions in this case, the love Winston feels for Julia.

To retain our individuality as humans, independent thought is central to our collective human experience .The suppression and modification of language is central helping the party maintain their rule over the masses. Language is of central importance to human thought because it structures and limits the ideas that individuals are capable of formulating and expressing. If control of a language were centralised to a political agency, Orwell proposes, such an agency could possibly alter the very structure of language to make it impossible to even conceive of disobedient or rebellious thoughts, as there would be no words to think them. The invention and implementation of newspeak, which is an altered form of regular English, is deliberately contradictory and ambiguous to manipulate and mislead the public with the ultimate goal that no one will be capable of conceptualising anything that might question the party’s absolute power. As we follow the protagonist Winston around we come to understand the power of being able to manipulate the masses through removing potentially critical words out of the dictionary or deliberately make them lose meaning. The oxymoron of the slogans ‘War is Peace’, ‘Freedom is slavery’ and ‘Ignorance is Strength’ is formally defined into their conceptual opposites to make language itself untrustworthy and confuse the populace on the true meaning of these words. Similarly the four ministries, have ironic name, the Ministry if Love, Peace, Plenty and truth operate outside their labels to mislead the population.    

To end up '1984' book report essay, through Orwell's dystopian novel we can notice what life looks like under totalitarian government pressure. Control of information and history is another factor which affects on human free will. In the Ministry of Truth, the Party controlled every source of information. They rewrote the history and distorted facts on their own advantage. Due to the modifications made, memories became unreliable and society was more willing to believe in the Party vision of history. At present, people are constantly being inundated with information. Because of a huge amount of news people are not able to remember everything and check the reliability of sources. The reality is different than this one presented on the television. We as humans are manipulated by misinformation and a large part of population only believe what they can see or hear in the media, the result of which is life in a world full of lies and backstabbing. In Orwell’s 1984, the Party inspects its members by telescreens. It was a television that watched the user back. By means of microphones and telescreens the Party led by Big Brother was able to surveil daily life of society. In that way privacy did not exist. Nowadays, because of mass media we are doomed to failure. Personal information can be found on almost every site or social media accounts. We as humans are not anonymous anymore due to the Internet. Even in the comfort of our own home, we are under constant surveillance. World presented in 1984 is much more depressing than the current one but technological development facilitates the surveillance of society. “Thanks” to the Internet it is much easier to steal private information and the government can spy us on every moment of our lives. We are not anonymous anymore because our every move is controlled as in Orwell’s 1984.