Beruflich Dokumente
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Ioana Frca
25 January 2017
George Orwell, the pseudonym of Eric Arthur Blair was an English novelist, essayist and
critic. He was born on 25 June 1903, in Motihari. He is known for his satirical and dystopian
fiction with such works as Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four. In the most of his works, he
has strong doubts about the government and social order. He was a man of strong opinions who
The Spanish war and other events in 1936-37 turned the scale and thereafter I
knew where I stood. Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936
like our own, to think that one can avoid writing of such subjects. Everyone
writes of them in one guise or another. It is simply a question of which side one
He was a very important writer of the 20th century and became an inspiration for many writers,
for example, the term Orwellian is often used in reference to authors who do the same work.
Orwell states in his essay Why I Write that each authors subject matter will be
determined by the age he lives in -- at least this is true in tumultuous, revolutionary ages like our
own -- but before he ever begins to write he will have acquired an emotional attitude from which
he will never completely escape. (Why I write ) and he also talks about four reasons of writing
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such as sheer egoism, aesthetic enthusiasm, historical impulse and political purposes showing the
desire to push the world in a certain direction, to alter other peoples idea of the kind of society
He also states in another essay, Politics and the English Language, that the society in
which he lives is in decline, so the language is in decline, both language and society are subject
to the same decadence. The decadence of language it is the caused by political and economic
reasons, this decline can be prevented by the writer, by using good English, and it is not
permanent. He argues that the first step toward political regeneration is to think clearly. In his
vision language is not a tool through which the writer expresses his own purposes, but is seen as
a natural growth.
Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984) was published in 1948. The Last Man in Europe was the
original title that Orwell intended to choose, but his publisher disagreed and he finally chooses
1984. There are many theories about the books title that scholars talk about. The common belief
year 1948, the year when he wrote the book and appears as a dark mirror to the society in which
he lives. The book is a dystopian novel. Dystopia, as it is defined in the dictionary, is a society
characterized by human misery, as oppression, disease and overcrowding. It tells the story of
Winston Smith and his desire to oppose against the totalitarian regime, which characterizes the
state in which he lives. The story can be told in three parts: the first part shows Winstons hopes,
his personal reason and the background of the novel. The second shows the relationship between
Winston and Julia and in the third part Winston is captured and reprogrammed. Along with
Aldous Huxley's book entitled Brave New World, Nineteen Eighty-Four is one of the most
Harold Bloom says in his work: Nineteen Eighty-Four was fundamentally a product of
its authors political experience. (Bloom 12). In other words, Orwells political perceptions and
social characteristics are embodied in Winston Smith, he is a personification of its. The novel
background is very interesting and presents us a view of the future and how the society, ruled by
a rigid totalitarianism, would look like if there will not be any changes. The novel is set in
Oceania and the world which Orwell creates is ruled by a Government which main constitutes
are Big Brother which is an entity that controls the society and four branches:
They were the homes of the four Ministries between which the entire
itself with news, entertainment, education, and the fine arts. The Ministry of
Peace, which concerned itself with war. The Ministry of Love, which
maintained law and order. And the Ministry of Plenty, which was responsible
The first chapter begins with the portrait of Big Brother as it appears on a poster: On
each landing, opposite the lift shaft, the poster with the enormous face gazed from the wall. It
was one of those pictures which are so contrived that the eyes follow you about when you move.
BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU (Orwell 3). The message has a double meaning, on one
hand, Big Brother protects people and is interested in their fate; on the other hand, this entity
oversees everything. The society described in the novel is similar to the Stalinist Soviet Union
As the novel is set in a world ruled by the totalitarianism regime, the language becomes a
powerful tool, it was the main tool for propaganda and a way to controlling the population by the
Government. Roberto Ranieri said in his essay Language and Power that:
the novel as a scheme that operates in order not only to manipulate, but mainly
realizes a mind control of its subjects that is total in both extension and
The Newspeak is a fictional language invented by Orwell, is the official language of his fictional
world Oceania. In the Appendix to his novel that is entitled The Principle of Newspeak, Orwell
states that: The purpose of Newspeak was not only to provide a medium of expression for the
world-view and mental habits proper to the devotees of Ingsoc, but to make all other modes of
thought impossible. He also emphasizes that Newspeak is divided into three categories
distinguished by the formation of words. These categories are known as the A vocabulary
(contains the most common words in English, their meaning is strictly delimited) the B
vocabulary (also called compound words with political meaning, all the words in this category
are subordinated to the concept of Doublethink), and the C vocabulary (it is composed
exclusively of technical and scientific expressions). Doublethink is used for a better control of
to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to
believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of
into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to
forget it again, and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself
then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just
To conclude, Nineteen Eighty-Four is a dystopian novel that emphasizes the place of the
language in a totalitarian state. This state is Oceania, one of the three powers (Oceania, Eurasia,
Eastasia) that are fighting into a war without a cause. The war is a way to keep alive the peoples
fear, to focus their hatred towards a defined enemy and ultimately to control them. The past is
mystified and language is adjusted with the new values of society. George Orwells 1984 is a
bleak vision of the future that he foresees in 1948 when he wrote the novel.
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Works cited
Orwell, George, Such, Such Were The Joys, "Why I Write, New York, 1953
Bloom, Harold, Blooms Guides: 1984, Chelsea House, New York, 2004
Ranieri, Roberto. Language and power George Orwells 1984 and Cormac McCarthys The Road
philosophica : International journal on philosophy and religion, January 2017, 95-102. Hrcak
Orwell, George. Politics and the English Language Resort. 1946. Web. 20 Feb.
2017. http://www.resort.com/~prime8/Orwell/patee.html.
Orwell, George, Nineteen Eighty-Four, Appendix. The Principles of Newspeak. Web. 20 Feb.
2017 https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/o/orwell/george/o79n/appendix.html