Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
!984 - A shocking future from 1949, October 17, 2008
It is truly amazing to look at the fantastic writing minds of our grandparents' time. Post-WWII fever hung over the population and many were clueless, or even fearful for not knowing what lie before them. And, unlike many, George Orwell was a man who was not afraid to show what he interpreted as a possible future for not only our country, but the entire world.
In his novel, 1984, Orwell crafted a post-apocalyptic world in which the planet's powers had been divided into three portions; Oceania, which consisted of the Americas, Eurasia, comprised continental Europe and northern Asia, and Eastasia, which, as its title implies, covered most of the eastern Asian continent.
The story follows the life of a middle aged man named Winston Smith, another Drone of Eurasia's Main power, The conspicuous Party, whose god-like leader and people-worshiped Big Brother, control everyday life.
Except for the homes the proles, who are sort of like peasants, every room is garmented with a Telescreen, a sort of T.V. which can never be turned off or muted. Unfortunately, it can also see and hear everything going on in the room.
Most standard crime has been wiped out due to massive military force, and so the party, in its never ending search for power, falls upon people with psychic powers to detect felonous thoughts in people. These psychics are known as the thought police, and constantly track down and "delete" people who are convicted of crimethink (a word from Eurasia's new national language, called Newspeak).
Our "hero", Winston's job is to help the party erase any evidence of their saying or doing anything wrong, to control their people's minds and
opinions of the party. Ultimately, they are "Censoring the past". One day the country could be at war with Eastasia, the next, Eurasia, and the entire populace would accept that they had always been at war with Eurasia, and any thoughts otherwise was crimethink.
Winston, unhappy with this life and detesting the party, secretly purchases a pen and diary, the use of both have been outlawed for some time. This is simply the beginning in a long string of rebellion, love, and unanswered questions that keep this book in your mind whenever you are not reading it.
This is one of the most fantastic sci-fi novel experiences I have ever had, and while particular sections of the book can drag on for far too long, the character depth and plot more than makes up for it. Anyone who wishes to deny this book as a classic great has not the brains to understand it, and therefore cannot accurately judge its prowess.
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1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Deviates corrected for their own good, August 17, 2007
In a society that has eliminated many imbalances, surplus goods, and even class struggle, there are bound to be deviates; Winston Smith is one of those. He starts out, due to his inability to doublethink, with thoughtcrime. This is in a society that believes a thought is as real as the deed. Eventually he graduates through a series of misdemeanors to illicit sex and even plans to overthrow the very government that took him in as an orphan.
If he gets caught, he will be sent to the "Ministry of Love" where they have a record of 100% cures for this sort of insanity. They will even forgive his past indiscretions.
Be sure to watch the three different movies made from this book:
1984 (1954) Peter Cushing is Winston Smith
1984 (1956) Edmond O'Brien is Winston Smith
Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984) John Hurt is Winston smith
1984 Actors: Edmond O'Brien, Jan Sterling
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0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Doublethink, July 5, 2009
While 1984 is now considered a cautionary tale about totalitarianism, it should be remembered that Orwell was an ardent socialist. Perhaps the most important (and least discussed) element of the story of 1984 is the doublethink of its author: Orwell's ability to condemn an outcome, while advocating its cause. Even as Orwell portrayed the corruption of socialist government in Animal Farm and the cruelty of totalitarian government in 1984, he insisted that these are perversions of socialism, rather than the inevitable fruit of socialism.
This is the same foolish idea as Marx had; that human nature is malleable and can be forced to adapt to a socialist zeitgeist. Sadly, many people suffer the same delusion today; believing that government has the right to mold human nature rather than the responsibility to yield to human nature and respect our natural rights. Socialists do not like that human nature opposes slavery (i.e. socialism) and insist that with enough socialist indoctrination and through the force of socialist government, human nature can be remade to love subjugation.
When we look to the troubling conclusion, it appears to be a break from the tradition of a successful resolution for the hero of the novel. Just as Brave New World ended with the State purging its misfits from its midst, 1984 ends with the arrest and reeducation of its misfit. Could it be that this was a successful conclusion in the mind of a socialist? Could it be that socialists are so wedded to their ideology that they have lost the ability to sympathize with human rights to liberty and freedom of conscience and would rather sympathize with the State? What if the ending reveals that the hero of a socialist novel was never meant to be the individual; is the hero in fact the State?
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by Aldous Huxley
by George Orwell
by Ray Bradbury
by J.D. Salinger
by Thomas C. Foster
