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Symbolism In George Orwell's '1984'

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How would you feel to live life in a constant cycle of work, lie, eat, lie, sleep, under constant supervision? When examining George Orwell's 1984 through a Marxist lens one sees Orwell's criticism of totalitarian regimes in the way Winston Smith is attempting to avoid each threat that comes his way, while attempting to live the life of a free man. The totalitarian regime works on a basis of power. The government controls the minds of each citizen to favor the party. The perfect orthodox mind is one that does not question the ruling of the government nor the injustices it causes. “Orthodoxy means not thinking, not needing to think. Orthodoxy is unconscious.”(Page 56) Civilians wanting to be good will then go through life wanting to do what …show more content…

The injustices he faces on a day to day basis cause a repressed rage and even further a purposeful feeling of resentment towards both the party and the entire idea of orthodoxy. He felt that his rage was an “undirected emotion which could be switched from one object to another like the flame of a blowlamp. Thus at one moment Winston’s hatred was not turned against Goldstein at all, but, on the contrary, against Big Brother, the Party and the thought police”. (page 16) During the two minute hate Winston finds himself feeling resentment towards the party by feeling a sense of discomfort due to the nature of following rules blindly. Winston is an inquisitive thinker and has complex ideas and morals that the party had not yet stripped of him. Karl Marx hypothesized that a man has two sides that determine his life in Winston Smith the reader sees both. The two sides are as follows, “Man, is first of all a natural being. As a natural being and a living natural being, he is endowed on the one hand with natural powers, vital powers…; these powers exist in him as aptitudes, instincts. On the other hand, as an objective, natural, physical, sensitive being, he is a suffering, dependent and limited being…, that is, the objects of his instincts exist outside him, independent of him, but are the objects of his need, indispensable and essential for the realization and confirmation of his substantial

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