1984 Commentary
Isolation
Winston lives in a world where everything is done in worship of Big Brother. All thoughts, feelings, and accomplishments are given and credited to Big Brother. However, the people of the Party are left with little and they dedicate their lives to Big Brother creating a lonely existence for themselves. Winston Smith does not want to be alone; he wishes to be able to share his thoughts and opinions with someone. Through rhythm, figurative language, and imagery George Orwell creates a world in which people are isolated from one another and deprived which leads Winston into writing a diary of his opinions. Winston’s writings in his diary are brought together in a rhythmic way from the repetition of lines starting with “to a time when” and later “from the age of”. Winston is attempting to write to someone in his diary and uses “to a time when” to give himself someone to write to. Each repetition is different however in that Winston specifies a different thing. He specifies “thought is free” and where “truth exists and what is done cannot be undone”. Winston’s imagination is coming through here in that he is imaging what he thinks the world was and might become one day. Then Winston reverses the stanza and turns it into a description of his time period and who is writing the diary. Winston comes from an “age of uniformity” and ”solitude” controlled by Big Brother. The steady rhythm and then quick change helps create the differences in what Winston is comparing between another age of freedom, and his age of “solitude.” Orwell uses figurative language to display the rough conditions and lonely lives that are forced upon the people of the Party. Winston is “a lonely ghost” in that he feels that he is alone in his opinions and thoughts of the Party and Big Brother. Nothing he writes would ever be accepted by the high standards of the Party. Furthermore, the soap that Winston uses to clean his fingers was “gritty dark-brown soap which rasped your skin
Winston lives in a world where everything is done in worship of Big Brother. All thoughts, feelings, and accomplishments are given and credited to Big Brother. However, the people of the Party are left with little and they dedicate their lives to Big Brother creating a lonely existence for themselves. Winston Smith does not want to be alone; he wishes to be able to share his thoughts and opinions with someone. Through rhythm, figurative language, and imagery George Orwell creates a world in which people are isolated from one another and deprived which leads Winston into writing a diary of his opinions. Winston’s writings in his diary are brought together in a rhythmic way from the repetition of lines starting with “to a time when” and later “from the age of”. Winston is attempting to write to someone in his diary and uses “to a time when” to give himself someone to write to. Each repetition is different however in that Winston specifies a different thing. He specifies “thought is free” and where “truth exists and what is done cannot be undone”. Winston’s imagination is coming through here in that he is imaging what he thinks the world was and might become one day. Then Winston reverses the stanza and turns it into a description of his time period and who is writing the diary. Winston comes from an “age of uniformity” and ”solitude” controlled by Big Brother. The steady rhythm and then quick change helps create the differences in what Winston is comparing between another age of freedom, and his age of “solitude.” Orwell uses figurative language to display the rough conditions and lonely lives that are forced upon the people of the Party. Winston is “a lonely ghost” in that he feels that he is alone in his opinions and thoughts of the Party and Big Brother. Nothing he writes would ever be accepted by the high standards of the Party. Furthermore, the soap that Winston uses to clean his fingers was “gritty dark-brown soap which rasped your skin