the 'point' of 1984? help?
I know this is general and probably dumb...but my Lit teacher asked me to write an essay as to what the "point" of 1984 was. Well, the exact prompt says "What do you think is the main idea that Orwell is trying to get across in his book? Does he make his point effectively?"
I CAN'T THINK OF ANYTHING LOGICAL. I thought the point of the book was that the government will always crush you, and that one person cannot make a difference. However, it's kinda hard to write about that. I was thinking maybe adding something like "you have to try" but then like...why do you have to try?
I'm horribly stuck, and anyone that could help would be TOTALLY AWESOME.
Why Orwell truly wrote this book...
I also read this book for school, and worked out alot of the meaning of the book (I also did background research). I think it focused less on people than you think. In the book, there are only 3 major "countries" in the world, (don't remember all the names) and they are at constant war.
***Most of the following is only to further understand what the last few paragraphs say. If you don't feel like reading this, go to the last 4 paragraphs****
Now, if you think about war, it's usually started for some cause, right? Now, think about all dynasties and that (like Rome) They always had one leader, a higher class, a middle class, and a lower class. In all votes, the upper and middle would go against the lower class. (they did this in all matters) so the lower class was never allowed to ascend. Then, over time, the lower and middle classes would revolt against the higher, and there would be a time of peace and equality, but over time a new lower middle and higher class would be formed.
In this case, governments were always overthrown, being replaced by new ones. Over time (in 1984), The governments became aware of this, and worked at ways of making this impossible. I could go on for hours about the details, but heres the main idea:
In this new government, people still strived for peace, but it never really happened. Soon, however, they found a way to keep ONE government in power indefinately. The only way to do this was 1. To keep the lower class from realising that they COULD have more, and 2. To keep the middle class from WANTING more. The answer: War.
During war, most production is spent on weapons and the like, meaning less for everything else. When all production is towards war, there is little development in other fields. So, the Party, and the other 2 world powers, all decided on the same thing. Bye putting the world in never ending war, all other development would cease. With all the war, people basically stopped learning do to the halt in technology, and pretty much everything else.
It also solved a long thought of problem. Peace... by pitting the world in permanant war, they in effect destroyed war altogether. In all the years of this new war, the total death toll was equal to, or even lower than, pretty much any given day during WWI or II. There was little to no fighting on the front lines, but instead countries spent time sending rockets at eachother, often destroying little more than property. This, of course, meant that that country had to rebuild what they lost. This circle of building, destroying, and rebuilding, is what kept production of anything else at zero.
***This is the most important part of this***
Now, it may seem I was off topic there, but I'm not. The entire purpose of all this was to keep the people occupied with war. They worried about little else (as seen in the book, when they announced newly wan battles and the like). All this helped to un-educate the public, keeping them in control, so that they would not revolt and create a new government. Now, the Party could last forever, because ultimately, no-one knew that government COULD be overthrown, or even cared to do so.
This whole background is ultimately based on society today, and the point of Orwell writing this story is that this is where he believed we are heading, and in all honesty, It's true. This new war in Iraq, for example. What is the true point of this war? I've heard many different stories, but who knows what's true.
Then take into account the news and media. If you see a story on T.V. about a cure for cancer, will you believe it? Probably, because that is where we learn our information. In 1984, it worked the same way, but for the party. They could feet the people any amount of crap they wanted, and the people would soak it all in. Here, in reality, this is happening already, but much more subtly. People believe in aliens because the T.V. said they exist. Has anyone seen an alien? who knows, but the T.V. says they're real, so what else do we have to go by?.
That is how it is in 1984. People believe the Party is right, because they don't know anything else. This book was a prediction of our future, and since the time of it's writing, we have already moved closer to that dark world.
