小说1984介绍

Introduction

Nineteen Eighty-Four, is a dystopian novel by George Orwell published in 1949.

A dystopia is a community or society that is in some important way undesirable or frightening. It is the opposite of a utopia.

When George Orwell had finished writing a political fiction book in 1948, he looked for a title. As the subject of his book was a pessimistic political vision, needing a futur e dimension, he decided that it might be a good idea to simply invert the last two digit s of the year during which the book was written - and call it "1984.

Anti-Utopia Trilogy 反乌托邦三部曲

前苏联的叶.扎米亚京的《我们》

英国阿道司?赫胥黎Aldous Huxley的《美丽新世界》

以及最有名的乔治·奥维尔的1984

background

in 1984, after a global war,nuclear weapon destoryed previous social order and civilization process, the world broken into three super countries in 1984.Ocean States, Eurasian [ju?'rei??n and East Asian countries(大洋国、欧亚国和东亚国)The story happened In London, the Airstrip One capital city of Oceania.

The social class system of Oceania is threefold:

(I) the upper-class Inner Party, the elite ruling minority, who make up 2% of the population.

(II) the middle-class Outer Party, who make up 13% of the population.

(III) the lower-class Proles (from proletariat), who make up 85% of the population and represent the uneducated working class.

The leader of this government is a fictional figure known as “Big Brother” , all citizens must love and respect him. In this society, there is no privacy and freedom, also, there is no friend, only comrades.The independents had been cleaned up.

The political power was finnal target and authority. People are constantly monitored by telescreens and subjected to a constant barrage of propaganda.

The Party controls everything in Oceania, even the people’s history and language. Thinking rebellious thoughts is illegal,thoughtcrime is the worst of all.

In the year 1984, Ingsoc (English Socialism), is the regnant ideology of Oceania, and Newspeak is its official language of official documents.

War is peace

Freedom is slavery

Ingnorance is strength

Ministries of Oceania

The Ministry of Peace :supports Oceania's perpetual war.

The Ministry of Plenty: rations and controls food,goods, and domestic production.

The Ministry of Truth controls information: news, entertainment, education, and the arts. Winston Smith works in the Minitrue RecDep (Records Department), "rectifying" historical records to concord with Big Brother's current pronouncements, thus everything the Party says is true

The Ministry of Love: which deals with law and order (torture and Brainwashing).The Ministry of Love identifies, monitors, arrests, and converts real and imagined dissidents.

Plot

An English novel about life in a dictatorship as lived by Winston Smith, an intellectual worker at the Ministry of Truth, and his degradation when he runs afoul of the totalitarian (极权主义的) government of Oceania (大洋洲), the state in which he lives in the year that he presumes is 1984.

Big Brother- Though he never appears in the novel, and though he may not actually exist, Big Brother, the perceived ruler of Oceania, is an extremely important figure.

A minor member of the ruling Party in near-future London, Winston Smith is a thin, frail, contemplative, intellectual, and fatalistic thirty-nine-year-old. Winston hates the totalitarian control and enforced repression that are characteristic of his government. He harbors revolutionary dreams.

Julia- Winston’s lover, a beautiful dark-haired girl working in the Fiction Department at the Ministry of Truth. Julia enjoys sex, and claims to have had affairs with many Party members. Julia is pragmatic and optimistic. Her rebellion against the Party is small and personal, for her own enjoyment, in c ontrast to Winston’s ideological motivation.

O’Brien- A mysterious, powerful, and sophisticated member of the Inner Party whom Winston believes is also a member of the Brotherhood.

Mr. Charrington - An old man who runs a secondhand store in the prole district. Kindly and encouraging, Mr. Charrington seems to share Winston’s interest in the past. He also seems to support Winston’s rebellion against the Party and his relationship with Julia, since he rents Winston a room without a telescreen in which to carry out his affair. But Mr. Charrington is not as he seems. He is a member of the Thought Police. Mr. Charrington, the proprietor of the store, is revealed as having been a member of the Thought Police all along.

Winston Smith is a low-ranking member of the ruling Party in London, in the nation of Oceania.

As the novel opens, Winston feels frustrated by the oppression and rigid control of the Party, which prohibits free thought, sex, and any expression of individuality. Winston dislikes the party and has illegally purchased a diary in which to write his criminal thoughts.

Winston works in the Ministry of Truth, where he alte rs historical records to fit the needs of the Party. He notices a coworker, a beautiful dark-haired girl, staring at h im, and worries that she is an informant who will turn him in for his thoughtcrime. One day, Winston receives a note from the dark-haired girl that reads “I love you.” She tells him her name, Julia, and they begin a covert affair,. Eventually they rent a room above the secondhand store in the prole district where Winston bought the diary. This relationship lasts for some time. Winston is sure that they will be caught and punished sooner or later (the fatalistic Winston knows that he has been doomed since he wrote his first diary entry), while Julia is more pragmatic and optimistic. As Winston’s affair with Julia progresses, his hatred for the Party grows more and more intense. At last, he receives the message that he has been waiting for: O’Brien wants to see him.

Winsto n and Julia travel to O’Brien’s luxurious apartment. As a member of the powerful Inner Party (Winston belongs to the Outer Party), O’Brien leads a life of luxury that Winston can only imagine. O’Brien confirms to Winston and Julia that, like them, he hates the Party, and says that he works against it as a member of the Brotherhood. He indoctrinates Winston and Julia into the Brotherhood, and gives Winston a copy of Emmanuel Goldstein’s book, the manifesto of the Brotherhood. Winston reads the book—an amalgam of several forms of class-based twentieth-century social theory—to Julia in the room above the store. Suddenly, soldiers barge in and seize them. Mr. Charrington, the proprietor of the store, is revealed as having been a member of the Thought Police all along.

Torn away from Julia and taken to a place called the Ministry of Love, Winston finds that O’Brien, too, is a Party spy who simply pretended to be a member of the Brotherhood in order to trap Winston into committing an open act of rebellion against the Party. O’Brien spends months torturing and brainwashing Winston, who struggles to resist. At last, O’Brien sends him to the dreaded Room 101, the final destination for anyone who opposes the Party. O’Brien straps a cage full of rats onto Winston’s head and prepares to allow the rats to eat his face. Winston snaps, pleading with O’Brien to do it to Julia, not to him.

Giving up Julia is what O’Brien wanted from Winston all along. His spirit broken, Winston is released to the outside world. He meets Julia but no longer feels anything for her. At last, he becamean ilde drunk, accepted the thought theroy of party. He recognized " he defeated himself. He loves big brother. ”

In 1998, the Modern Library ranked Nineteen Eighty-Four 13th on its list of the 100 b est English-language novels of the 20th century. Many of the terms and concepts in G eorge Orwell’s 1984 have entered contemporary society. For example, your average e ducated citizen will understand terms like Big Brother, double think, and Newspeak. Moreover, as a result of the novel, the adjective Orwellian has entered the English voc abulary. Orwellian refers to a totalitarian regime’s use of propaganda, close surveillan ce of citizens, and/or manipulation of the past

The destructiveness of totalitarianism and the human love of power for powers sake.

Famous Remark

Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past. Thoughtcrime does not entail death: thoughtcrime is death.

Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four.

Under the spreading chestnut tree ,I sold you and you sold me