1984-The ending

[sunshine_enl]

I read 1984 in a single day,I was mesmerized by it and when I read the last line "He loved Big Brother" I felt so sad,yet puzzled!
What did Orwell mean by that?I gave it a lot of thinking and I still haven't decided what was Orwell's point.
On one hand I always felt that Winston decided to love the Big Brother because he had to, and by that I mean that loving the Big Brother also ensured his existence,he could go on living.So in a way he succeeded becuase he submits to the Party willingly,he knows that there is no other way out(I don't know if this makes any sense).
But this "decided" on the other hand is quite problematic because it implies will left in him and I am not sure that after all he goes through there's any possibility for that.
And lets keep in mind that from the begining he is sure that he will fail,that eventually he will be arrested,so how could he ever succeed?
Maybe Orwell felt that in such totalitarian regimes there is no possibility left for resistance.

So,what did you think the ending was all about?

[WICKES]

Maybe Orwell felt that in such totalitarian regimes there is no possibility left for resistance.


I think you are right. Winston really does love Big Brother by the end, he isn't just pretending to in order to save his life. Orwell is saying that in a Stalinesque regime you cannot even retain an inner freedom. At least when you are at work you can secretly think "I ****ing hate this job and my ugly little boss", but in 1984 it is not enough to obey, you must surrender all free will. The regime wants to control the way you see reality ("how many fingers am I holding up..."), to get inside your head and dictate even there. When you are utterly brainwashed you may believe that you are still deciding, but in fact your decisions are determined by the regime.

That is my interpretation anyway.

[chrismythoi]

yes i agree. there are many themes in the book which point to the government wishing to destroy its citizen's minds, hence the newspeak, which aims to limit the range of thought and feeling (double plus bad).
i think an interesting thing to consider is the difference in endings between 1984 and animal farm. in animal farm the animals become people, hence all revolutionaries are tyrants in disguise. 1984 has a far more bleak outlook on the capacity of people to break free from imposed thought patterns. in many ways he was correct. one only has to look at the daily mail and the red tops (newspapers in uk) to see how far the public outlook on the world has been eroded by subtle stupidity. i really hate the mail.

[joseph90ie]

hey Wickes...'i ****ing hate this job and my ugly little boss' - lol!

[five-trey]

The ending portrays the greatest, most heinous act of the Big Brother regime - robbing the people of their free will. Its notable because it represents the corruption of not just a basic civil right, but the greatest of Natural right.

While Stalin's regime took away every possible Earthly right from its enemies ending in their death, Orwell takes it a step further. Winston's God-given rights are assaulted to the point where he is divested of his own essence, in effect becoming less human.

When Winston is taken in and tortured, he goes through the loss of himself in a couple of stages. In the scene where Brian brainwashes him into believing that 2 + 2 does not equal 4, he is stripping Winston of the logical layer of his mind; the part that allows him to use reason for his decisions. The part which does not allow him to fall subject to a government riddled with fallacy.

Later, when Winston is forced to face his worst fears in those rats, he gives up Julia and therefore surrenders his love for her. Here, he is robbed of his emotion, the irrational part of his mind which leads him to 'gut-feeling' decisions; the gut feelings which inspire his natural odium for Big Brother and what he represents.

In the ending, however, Winston gives in, and finally realizes that he loves Big Brother. Trully, he loves him. This scene represents the final, and most despicable act of his de-humanization. Now the ability to make his own decision is gone. And he becomes another hollow robot for Big Brother.


All of it really comes together to create Orwell's warning. "Totalitarianism has already taken away civil rights. Next, it will strip us of the very things which make us human."