Chapter 1:

1: What is a telescreen, can you build one today, should you?

A telescreen is a two-way listening and viewing device; an electronic picture box, which
constantly displays propaganda, and both watches and listens its owners. Everyone is required
to own one. Telescreens can never be turned off, only dimmed; they resemble steel mirrors, with
metal bars at the bottom.

We have this technology today, our Smartphones are basically telescreens without the
propaganda.

2: What are the four government ministries that control Oceania?

The Ministry of Peace: Minipax, deals with War and defense

The Ministry of Plenty: Miniplenty, deals with economic ventures

The Ministry of Love: Miniluv, Deals with Law and Order

The Ministry of Truth: Minitru, deals with news, education, and the arts.

The Ministry of Silly Walks: Miniwalk, deals with advanced forms of foot transportation.

3: Why does winston want to keep a diary. Why can he be punished for it?

The diary is his outlet, where he can privately express all his pent-up anti-party thoughts. He can
be arrested and executed for Thoughtcrime, which is the act of having anti-party thoughts,
enforced by the Thought Police.

4: What is the Two-Minutes-Hate Who is Emmanuel Goldstein.

The two minutes hate is a small section of time every week, where the telescreen broadcast
hate speech against Goldstein, who was the first traitor to the Party; an advocate for free speech
and human rights. The mere act of seeing him causes people to fly into a directionless terror and
unhinged rage.
Chapter 2:

1. Why are parents afraid of their children?

Children are indoctrinated as spies early on, and will often turn their parents into the
government.

2. What does OBrien say to Winston in his dream?

They would meet in a place with no darkness This may be the unknown location in
Winstons institution.

3. What was winstons dream about; What does it tell us about him?
Chapter 5:

1. Newspeak reduces the vocabulary of the people of Oceania, so that intricacies and a
greyness scale can be removed; it makes everything radicalized, and reduces things to
Good (Party approved) and Ungood (Not party approved) without allowing
counterpoints. Everything is wholly good, or wholly bad.

2. The thought police are police which capture and punish people who think ungood
thoughts against the partys ideals. They are undercover, secret agents implanted into the
general population.

3. Winston believes people with whole, complete thoughts; people who can still form
opinions and coherent ideas, people from his generation, will be the ones getting
vaporized. The party wants to remove all possible opposition to them, and raise a
generation of children who know nothing but what the party tells them; people who dont
have the memories of better things.

Chapter 6:

1. Winston has a terrible marriage, to a woman he doesnt love, never sees, and who hates
him. It was a state approved marriage.

2. Winston lives alone because he could not produce a child with his wife, and chose to live
separately about ten or eleven years ago.
3.
Chapter 7:

1. The proles are the working class of Oceania, who, Winston says, could overthrow the
party in a day if they all woke up, and realized that they could.

2. Theres some truth, as all good propaganda has a grain of truth, but as with everything
its skewed in the Partys favour, making the capitalists seem like horrible slave drivers,
who care only for a rich inner party of businessmen and politicians. There is no way to
check this for accuracy in the world of 1984, all that exists is what the party wants to
exist.

3. The Chestnut tree cafe, is a small cafe where writers and thinkers come to talk and
collaborate, and where they are often found and killed. Jones, Anderson, and Rutherford,
are all anti-party writers, who were popular at the cafe before they were executed.

4. He knows how the party operates, but he doesnt know why.

Chapter 8:

1. He went to the junk shop to get away from his problems, researching the history of the
world, and to buy a glass paperweight with a chunk of coral in it.

2. He fears her because hes attracted to her; he gets strange and worrying fearful feelings
when he sees her.
NEWSPEAK:

According to the appendix, what was the purpose of Newspeak?

To simplify the english language, and make everything more simple; Newspeak was designed to
make things totally radical one way or the other, nothing is grey, its only wholly good, or wholly
bad. This way, if anyone disagrees with the party, then they will be a radical defier of the system,
and can be punished.

What are the three different levels of vocabulary in Newspeak?

A Vocabulary, B Vocabulary, and C Vocabulary.

What are the two outstanding characteristics of Newspeak grammar?

Removing unnecessary words, and contracting two words together to mean another.

A great many of the B-vocabulary words were euphemisms. What are euphemisms?
Why would a government want to use them?

How does Newspeak deal with the matter of sex?

According to the appendix, totalitarian governments like to use abbreviations. Why is

this the case?

Why would it be nearly impossible to translate a document like the Declaration of

Independence into Newspeak?

The declaration of independence has far too many complexities and moral greyness to be
shifted to newspeak, not to mention, some words in the declaration no longer exist in Newspeak;
this is quite purposeful, as they dont want anybody to be able to understand what the declaration
says, or be able to write a new one.

How would you say Big Brother is really, really bad in Newspeak?

You wouldnt! Big Brother is only DoublePlusGood!

What does goodthink mean? Is it a verb or a noun? Is Winston Smith a good
thinker?

Goodthink is a verb, it means somebody who only has good See; pro-party) thoughts. Winston
is an Ungood thinker.

What does Oldthinkers unbellyfeel Ingsoc mean in standard English? Why is it hard to
translate?

What does duckspeak mean? Is it good or bad?

Duckspeak is both good and bad; it is the word given to incomprehensible quacking which
people give when they rant on certain subjects. When it is an ungood rant, its bad, but a good
rant, and its good!
PART TWO:

Chapter 2:

1. Winston trusts Julia because She seems to hold the same ideals as him, and has defied
the party to be with him.

2. Julia is attracted to Winstons seemingly true nature, he isnt a mindless party member
like the others, and he seems to have vague memories of the time before the revolution.

3. Julia is a brown-haired girl who works in the Fiction department at the Ministry of Truth;
shes intelligent, charismatic, good with her hands, and athletic, but she isnt much of a
reader, and considers books a commodity to be produced like wheat.

Chapter 3:

1. They cannot get married because the Party forbids any sort of attraction between people,
for fear that they may be having sex for reasons other than procreation. And secretly, the
party wishes to hold control, by making certain nobody has any ties to anyone else.

2. Julia works in the Fiction department at the Ministry of Truth, rewriting novels to for the
partys ideals; she does not write by hand, but rather runs the huge machines which
automatically rewrite the books.
3.
Chapter 4:

1. Julia brings coffee, tea, and sugar to the room above the junk shop. But she also has
makeup and perfume. Why is Winston so surprised to see her wearing make-up?

Almost nobody outside the Inner Party has access to makeup, its very difficult to get, and
somewhat frowned upon for the lower classes.

Chapter 5:

1. What happens to Syme?

Syme disappears one day; evaporated, gone, likely taken by the thought police.

2. Julia thinks that the rocket bombs that hit London everyday are fired by the
government of Oceania itself to keep the people frightened. Does that seem possible?

It seems very possible, especially considering Goldstein later explains the purpose of the war is
to keep the citizens poor and uneducated by using up resources, so they dont rebel. Its very
possible Oceania bombs its own citizens to make them hate the enemies, and give justification
for a pointless, unending war.

3. When Winston explains that the past is being erased, Julia doesnt care. Is she right?

She isnt morally right, I dont think. The past is something that needs to be preserved with
objective truth and accuracy, so that we can look back on it and draw parallels between what
happened then, and what happened now, so we dont fall victim to the same mistakes past
generations made; This is exactly why the party wants to suppress history.

Chapter 6:

1. Why is the meeting with OBrien important?

OBrian reveals he is part of a secret anti-government movement known as The Brotherhood

and he gives Winston and Julia the forbidden works of Goldstein, so they can learn the truth of
Oceania.
Chapter 7:

1.What happened to Winstons mother? What kind of boy was he?

Winstons mother was vaporized, along with his infant sister; He was a very mean child, one just
like the children of his day; He accidentally got his mother turned into the Thought Police.

2.Winston suggests that they should break up before they are found out. Julia says no.
Why?

They both know it cannot and will not last forever, so Julia wants to have it last as long as it can
before they both get vaporized by the government.

3.When they are talking about torture, confession, and betrayal, Julia says They can
make you say anythinganythingbut they cant make you believe it. They cant get
inside you. Do you think that is true?

No.. its very, very untrue. This book gets very dark in Part III. The Government knows how to
break you.
Chapter 8
1.Why is it surprising that OBrien makes reference to Symes?

They usually dont acknowledge anyone who's been evaporated.

2.Why do Winston and Julia go together to OBriens house?

To meet up with The Brotherhood and join a rebellion.

3.How is the life of an Inner Party member different from the life of an Outer Party
member?

Inner party members have excess, extravagance; they have the money and the luxuries.

4.OBrien asks Winston and Julia to agree to do some horrible things. Why do they agree
to everything except being separated?

Theyre willing to defy the party in every way, but they cant defy each other, they will never betray
the people they love.

Goldstein's Book

1.How is Goldsteins book organized?: It is organized by chapters, each breaking down one
of the three main slogans of the party.

2.According to Goldstein,
-What is the primary purpose of modern warfare?: Use up the resources, keep the people in
constant fear

-Why isnt there much scientific or technical progress?: The scientists were killed, and there
was no need to innovate beyond what we had, because any further advancements would
threaten to destabilize party control

-What are the two great aims of the Party?: Control and domination.

-What are the three groups that humans have been divided into since before history?:
The East Asians, the Eurasians, and Oceania, as well as the Debated zone.

-Do the three huge countries in the world have different political systems?: Yes; Oceania
is totalitarian, East Asia is full of Death Worshippers, and Eurasia is Marxist.
-What are the four ways a ruling group can fall from power?: There are only four ways in
which a ruling group can fall from power. Either it is conquered from without, or it governs so
inefficiently that the masses are stirred to revolt, or it allows a strong and discontented Middle
Group to come into being, or it loses its own self-confidence and willingness to govern. These
causes do not operate singly, and as a rule all four of them are present in some degree. A ruling
class which could guard against all of them would remain in power permanently. Ultimately the
determining factor is the mental attitude of the ruling class itself.

-What is the biggest danger to Big Brother?: The Proles, and the People.

-What is crimestop?: A way to keep people in line, and destroy anyone who may kindle a
rebellion against Big Brother.

3. Does the part of the book that Winston reads answer his question about why?: He
reads that the government really is trying to control people, and things werent always this way.

4. Do Goldsteins ideas make sense? Do you agree with them? Do they apply only to
Winstons society, or are they applicable to our own? Why or why not?: His ideas make
total sense, and theyre terrifying; they are very applicable to our current day.. Look at North
Korea, or even the U.S post 9/11, fear is a very strong use for control.

5. If Oceania is an oligarchy, then it doesnt have a dictator. Who or what is Big Brother?:
Big Brother is an Idea, hes like Batman, the idea of Big Brother is more important than any
person; hes the face of the partys ideals.
Socratic Seminar Questions:

1: How can the lessons of 1984 be applied to our world today? Specifically in the United
States and the U.K?

2: How much of the technology from 1984 became a reality in our world today? Could
what we have be used to monitor us?

3: Would you give the powers of the Oceania government to a force that was, at the time,
wholly good? Would you trust anyone with this sort of power?

4: How willing are you to give up your privacy for convenience and luxury, what would
you do if someone used that information against you?

5: What is your plan for running a totalitarian Regime?

6: Would you rather be in the Inner party, the Outer Party, or the Proles? What is nobler?

7: Are East Asia or Eurasia any better than Oceania? What about the Disputed Zones?

8: Would acts of terrorism against the government of Oceania be justified? Why or why
not?

9: If the Proles were to rise up, would they even stand a chance against the armies of
Oceania? Would Oceania kill its own people, openly, en masse?

10: What is the best way to escape Oceania, is there a way at all?
 When Winston and Julia first meet OBrien, he asks them to agree to do anything they are told
to do, including committing murder, performing sabotage that could cause the deaths of
hundreds of innocent people, and throwing acid in a childs face. They agree to everything except
separating and never seeing each other again, which is somewhat illogical because they have
already agreed to commit suicide if asked. It seems that if Big Brother will do anything to stay in
power, the Brotherhood will do anything to defeat Big Brother. If you were in Winston and Julias
situation, would you agree to these actions? Write an alternative version of this scene in which
Winston and Julia take a stronger moral stance and resist some of the things to which OBrien
asks them to agree. What would happen if they resisted?

DIALOGUE

OBrien: Comrades, are you prepared to give your lives, commit murder, commit acts of sabotage
which may cause the death of hundreds of innocent people, to cheat, forge, blackmail, corrupt the minds
of children, distribute habit forming drugs, encourage prostitution disseminate venereal diseases, or do
anything that is likely to cause demoralization and weaken the Party?

Winston: Pardon, what was that one before demoralization?!

OBrien: What if that meant to throw acid in a childs face? Would you do that?

Winston: Acid?! Wait hold on a minute, how will that help?

Julia: Im not opposed to it

Winston: What the heck, Julia?!

Julia: We should trust OBrien! He is part of the Brotherhood after all, isnt that what we have been
striving for? To create revolution and stop the Party?

OBrien: Julia has the right idea.

Winston: I just dont see how pouring acid on a childs face and selling our bodies as some sort of living
biological weapon would exactly help take down a totalitarian government.

OBrien: Its symbolic.

Julia: Aww, what? I was looking forward to actually doing this stuff.

Winston: JULIA!
Julia: What! I really dont like Big Brother!

Winston: You seemed kinda disappointed that you wouldnt be selling your body or mutilating children.

Julia: Well, the prostitution bit isnt so bad.

OBrien: I think were getting off track here.

Winston: God, I cant believe Im saying this, but I wish the thought police would show up right about
now.

OBrien: Boy, have I got good news for you

In writing this skit, think about the tone of the novel at this point. Is it ironic or satirical? Does it
have any element of humor? Or is it completely tragic? What kind of tone do you want to create
in your skit?

It has elements of satire, but it isnt comedic; its somewhat absurd, or dark? Im not sure how to
describe it, except as so tragic and awful that you laugh at how bad it must be.
PART 3

Chapter 1:

As Winston waits in the jail cell in the Ministry of Love, he meets the poet Ampleforth
and his neighbor Parsons. What are they in for?

Ampleforth is in for keeping the word God within a Kipling poem translation while Parsons is in
for thoughtcrime.

What is Room 101?

Room 101 is a torture chamber where they use your worst fear to recondition you into loving Big
Brother.

OBrien comes in the cell with a guard. What does Winston say? How does OBrien
reply? What does this mean?

Winston says They got you too! and OBrien replies They got me a long time ago. This could
mean that OBrien was also caught committing thoughtcrime and was also sent to the Ministry of
Love a long time ago, and is now working as Thought Police. It could also mean hes been
indoctrinated since forever.
Chapter 2:

Why does OBrien say that the photograph of Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford, which
he just showed to Winston, didnt exist and that he doesnt remember it?

OBrien uses doublethink to confuse Winston.

For the Party, does the past have a real existence?

No, its all erased, to make way for their approved past.

Why does OBrien want Winston to say that there are five fingers when he is only
holding up four? Why isnt he satisfied when Winston finally says five? What lesson is
OBrien trying to teach Winston?

He does this because he is trying to control what Winston knows is true. OBrien still isnt
satisfied because he knows that Winston is only forcing himself to say five when he actually
believes four. Hes trying to teach him to believe whatever the Party says is true even though
they go against common sense.

Winston wonders why they are torturing him if they are just going to kill him anyway.
What is OBriens answer?

When finally you surrender to us, it must be of your own free will. We do not destroy the heretic
because he resists us We convert him, we capture his inner mind, we reshape him. We
burn all evil and all illusion out of him; we bring him over to our side, not in appearance, but
genuinely, heart and soul. We make him one of ourselves before we kill him

What, according to OBrien, is the purpose of the Party?

The purpose of the party is to keep control and order.

Chapter III

Winstons torture and interrogation have several stages. What techniques are used in
each stage?

First, they make him doubt history, and show him they can change the past. Next they prove to
him that he can use doublethink as well, (2+2 = 5). And finally, they subject him to torture in room
101, where rats are placed on his chest to eat through him, until he finally betrays Julia, and
breaks his one promise.

According to OBrien, who actually wrote The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical
Collectivism? What does this mean, if true?

The Party wrote it, Goldstein and OBrien were both writers on it, its a trap to catch betrayers of
the party, and its unclear how much of it is actually true.

OBrien teaches that there is no world outside of the human mind, so that the Party can
control reality in the same way that he can make Winston see five fingers when there
are only four.This is Believing is seeing rather than Seeing is believing, as we
would normally say. Is it possible to so thoroughly brainwash someone that he or she will
see things that are not there?

Very much so, with sensory deprivation or hard drugs; and it is also possible to break someones
spirit so much that they will believe anything you say.

OBrien says that Winston should imagine a future in which a boot is stamping on a
human face forever. Winston tries to argue that such a vision would fail. Who do you
think is right?

In 1948, OBrien would be right, but in our modern age, were already seeing people rise up to
stop this, so, thanks to this book, and the availability of mass communication, I think it would be
much harder to do.
Chapter IV

Winston thinks he is making progress. He is learning to practice crimestop. What is he

learning? What is he hoping for?

Hes being re-brainwashed into loving Big Brother, and learning how to turn others into the
Ministry of Love, by detecting thought crime. He hopes to become thought police like OBrien.

Winston has a setback. In a daydream, he cries out. What does he say? What happens to
him?

He cries out for Julia, and against Big Brother; he is subsequently tortured, and sent to room
101.
Chapter V

What is waiting for Winston in Room 101? What does it make him do?

A cage full of rats, his worst fear. They are to be placed on his chest, and forced to burrow
through him, unless he confesses. In the end, he begs them to do it to Julia, and not him, thus
breaking his one promise, and fully being broken by the Party.
Chapter VI

Winston meets Julia. What happens?

It is revealed they both were sent to room 101, and they both broke down and begged for the
other to be tortured instead of themselves; they both broke their promise to each other.

What finally causes Winston to think he loves Big Brother?

Julia disappeared, Winston was brought back to the Ministry of Love, and moments before hes
executed, he sees a poster of Big Brother, and finds comfort in it, realizing that his struggle was
over, he did love Big Brother now.