1984 by George Orwell was an exciting read, as the plot turned in completely new directions on several occasions. At first, I was convinced that Winston would somehow lead the proles and his fellow citizens towards independence by breaking them free of the rule of the Party. Orwell did an excellent job by showing us Winston’s transformation from a confused and lonely man, into an emotional and loving one who discovers the reality of the Party’s terrorism and the reality of human nature, “The terrible thing that the Party had done was to persuade you that mere impulses, mere feelings, were of no account, while at the same time robbing you of all power over the material world… What mattered were individual relationships, and a completely helpless gesture, an embrace, a tear, a word spoken to a dying man, could have value in itself” (p. 169).
So, after convincing me that Winston would somehow find justice and defeat the Party, and live a happy life with Julia and show us a happy ending to the story, Orwell soon shows us that Winston will not be able to lead his fellow citizens toward freedom, because even the strongest of humans, like Winston, crumble under pressure. He shows us that humans only care about themselves. Even as a young boy, Winston betrayed his mother and his sister by taking their food ration, leading them to starve because he was too ignorant to realize that they were starving too. “He knew that he was starving the other two, but he could not help it; he even felt that he had a right to do it. The clamorous hunger in his belly seemed to justify him” (p. 166). Even O’Brien, who seems to be on Winston’s side from the beginning of the book, turns against Winston and reveals to him the truth of human nature, and Winston realizes that “You think there’s no way of saving yourself, and you’re quite ready to save yourself that way. You want it to happen to the other person. You don’t give a damn what they suffer. All you care about is yourself” (p. 303). I couldn’t believe that Winston even betrayed Julia, who he undoubtedly loved more than anything in the world. He seemed so happy, almost like a teenager falling in love for the first time, disobeying whatever rules the Party threw at him. Julia showed him how to find pleasure in life’s simplest activities, and it disappointed me that as soon as he was in danger, he tried everything he could just to save himself. All of his morals went right out the window.
Orwell reveals this sense of betrayal and selfishness in the human race in the novel, and in reality. In the afterword on p. 326, Orwell describes the First World War (the real war) how “This war, in which millions died for the territorial ambitions of the European powers, although under the illusion of fighting for peace and democracy, was the beginning of that development which tended in a relatively short time to destroy a two-thousand-year-old Western tradition of hope and to transform it into a mood of despair.” 1984 was an interesting read that made me think about our race and the issues Orwell predicted. Are we all really driven by selfish motives that come out when our greatest fears are staring us in the face?
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