What Year Is It, Anyway?

1984, a satirical piece of literature created by George Orwell to comment on society. As the book starts rolling, we meet the main character, Winston Smith. He lives in London during a time where a totalitarian regime has full control over everything, including what people say and do. The telescreens help with watching and listening to everything people say and do. 

Now, how is it a work of satire? A satire is usually defined as a work that mocks, exaggerates, or makes fun of a topic for social commentary and action. Knowing that 1984 was created in 1940, it is quite odd, just from looking at the cover, that a man who lived in the 1940s would write about the 1980s. 

Orwell clearly wanted to satirize how governments have been treating their people. Just at the start, the main character is against the government and purchases a diary to keep his thoughts, which is illegal. The fact that it is illegal to have a diary, shows how extensively invasive the society he created is. Since he is relating this to real life, it exaggerates the fact that the government does not want you to have your own thoughts, nor make your own decisions and actions. He uses the simple item of a diary to propose the idea that thoughts are illegal—and to the audience, that definitely makes them question all their motives, and ask, is the government really watching? 

As the continuation of many events occur, Orwell introduces Julia, who becomes Winston’s love. But, love is prohibited in London at this point. What to do? Get in trouble for one you love? This forced absence of love definitely mocks the idea that one cannot have their own thoughts. They must think, act, and love just as the Party wants them to. When Orwell exaggerates a country to that extreme, he wants to take on the social commentary up a level and make one question their government, and how they think that they are being treated in the country that they live in. O’Brien is a character that brings these two apart, because he is a member of the Party. He is a spy and gets into the story of Winston and Julia just to catch them disobeying the party and making them separate. This act exaggerates a policeman, where if one disobeys a law, the law in 1984 being love, they are instantly taken away with no questions asked. It makes one wonder, how far can a tyrannical power go without being ridiculous? Is Orwell just adding to the intensity to get more questions about one’s government?

The torture that O’Brien puts Winston through is that of extraordinary. For one to get tortured for not thinking the same way as the government is downright wrong. Orwell is clearly satirizing how life may be in the 1980s. As a man that wrote his novels in the 40s, it is quite difficult to see what will happen in the future, but he used what was going on at that point in history, such as Communism gaining control in countries such as Russia, to expand on it and make a prediction that Communism will rule all around the globe. All of this exaggeration sounds fairly familiar to me. Do you think some places are living in George Orwell’s 1984?