Name: 1984 - George Orwell
ISBN: 9781497490826

Save Time Summaries Staff

WARNING: This is not the actual book 1984 by George Orwell. Do not buy this Summary, Review & Analysis if you are looking for a full copy of this great book.In a world where dystopian novels are all the rage, George Orwell's 1984 stands as the definitive work. This study guide details the totality of totalitarianism, as you watch middle-aged Winston Smith try to escape from under the oppressive thumb of the Party. Big Brother is watching, controlling the thoughts and actions of everyone, thanks to 24-hour monitoring and the use of tattling children who are encouraged to report parents that speak out of line. As the main character in 1984, Winston is not convinced; he's hopeful of a way out. He is a complex character, and this study guide throws you directly into his mind as you go along for the ride.Orwell's 1984 begins with Winston doing what he does every day at his job: changing past newspaper records to ensure they match the latest "truths" set forth by the Party. Winston reluctantly endorses the Party's slogan, "He who controls the past, controls the future." He doesn't buy it though, so he makes it his mission to expose the group as the fraud that it is, even though he isn't old enough to remember "the good old days." Beside him is Julia, a woman who is equally at odds with how things are. As a testament to just how deep our study guide goes, we not only present you with potential quiz questions for each chapter, we also offer essay topics and multiple ideas to help you answer them.

1984 - George Orwell

abrildarocha

Evie Sprite

Neesha Balapitiya 

Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.

Moira

Lucik

Franzi

To the future or to the past, to a time when thought is free. when men are different from one another and do not live alone-to a time when truth exists and what is done cannot be undone: From the age of uniformity, from the age of solitude, from e age of Big Brother, from the age of doublethink-greetings!

“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past”

Abby

He tried to squeeze out some childhood memory that should tell him whether London had always been quite like this. 

It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time. 

…he couldn’t remember: nothing remained of his childhood except a series of bright-lit tableaux, occurring against no background and mostly unintelligible.

It was curious that he seemed not merely to have lost the power of expressing himself, but even to have forgotten what it was that he had originally intended to say. 

In a lucid moment Winston found that he was shouting with the others and kicking his heel violently against the rung of his chair. The horrible thing about the Two Minutes Hate was not that one was obliged to act a part, but that it was impossible to avoid joining in. Within tirty seconds any pretence was always unnecessary. 

And yet the rage that one felt was an abstract, undirected emotion which could be switched from one object to another like the flame of a blow lamp.

literally rip your own dick off and bleed out winston you unloveable fuck :

Suddenly, by the sort of violent effort with which one wrenches one's head away from the pillow in a nightmare, Winston succeeded in transferring his hatred from the face on the screen to the dark-haired girl behind him. Vivid, beautiful hallucinations flashed through his mind. He would flog her to death with a rubber truncheon. He would tie her naked to a stake and shoot her full of arrows like Saint Sebastian. He would ravish her and cut her throat at the moment of climax. Better than before, moreover, he realized wby it was that he hated her. He hated her because she was young and pretty and sexless, because he wanted to go to bed with her and would never do so, because round her sweet supple waist, which seemed to ask you to encircle it with your arm, there wAs only the odious scarlet sash, aggressive symbol of chastity. 

you hate women because you cant get any you incel fuck. ewwww

He disliked nearly all women, and especially the young and pretty ones. It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies and nosers-out of unorthodoxy. But this particular girl gave him the impression of being more dangerous than most.  

George Orwell

XAVIER COSTE

1984

Dani

George Orwell’s 1984 takes on new life with extraordinary relevance and renewed popularity. “Orwell saw, to his credit, that the act of falsifying reality is only secondarily a way of changing perceptions. It is, above all, a way of asserting power.”—The New Yorker In 1984, London is a grim city in the totalitarian state of Oceania where Big Brother is always watching you and the Thought Police can practically read your mind. Winston Smith is a man in grave danger for the simple reason that his memory still functions. Drawn into a forbidden love affair, Winston finds the courage to join a secret revolutionary organization called The Brotherhood, dedicated to the destruction of the Party. Together with his beloved Julia, he hazards his life in a deadly match against the powers that be. Lionel Trilling said of Orwell’s masterpiece, “1984 is a profound, terrifying, and wholly fascinating book. It is a fantasy of the political future, and like any such fantasy, serves its author as a magnifying device for an examination of the present.” Though the year 1984 now exists in the past, Orwell’s novel remains an urgent call for the individual willing to speak truth to power.

Классика в своем жанре, по-моему мнению заслуженно, также обязательно к прочтению

Jokude

It’s everything you’ve heard of and what it’s been hyped up to be. It takes you into the mind and the feeling of life under an authoritarian surveillance state, and how thoughtful rebellion is quashed under those conditions.

I can’t say enough good things about this book. I wasn’t sure how they would wrap up the ending, but its conclusion has truly stuck with me and is an experience to make you grateful for the freedom and privilege we have in this life. 100% worth reading when you can.

Kay so Queso

Excellent. A classic.

It’s everything you’ve heard of and what it’s been hyped up to be. It takes you into the mind and the feeling of life under an authoritarian surveillance state, and how thoughtful rebellion is quashed under those conditions.

I can’t say enough good things about this book. I wasn’t sure how they would wrap up the ending, but its conclusion has truly stuck with me and is an experience to make you grateful for the freedom and privilege we have in this life. 100% worth reading when you can.

1984 is a dystopian novel that predicts the future, a society dominated by "Fake News" where there is no way for the people to know what is true and what is not. It has been named as one of the best English language novels of the past century.

1984 George Orwell - Large Print Edition

As much as this book is a critique on authoritarian control and censorship, it’s also a criticism on capitalism and unchecked wealth. And George Orwell, what a sick motherfucker. I felt the nourishing quality of their love and then this disgusting, dark, and wretched feeling of the ending. Like what level of depressed are you to be able to make this bs??

a novel

Nineteen eighty-four

Michelle Dsouza

First read it in school, reread it at least 4 times since, and it still hits hard. 1984 is a dystopian classic set in a world where the government controls everything: information, language, history, even private thoughts. We follow Winston Smith, a man trying to survive inside a system built on surveillance, fear, and propaganda, where truth is something you’re told, not something you discover. It’s a tense, unsettling book, and it’s meant to be. What keeps me coming back to it is how sharp and chilling the ideas are. Orwell doesn’t just describe a scary future, he shows how power works when it’s unchecked: how people can be manipulated, how reality can be rewritten, how language can be used to shrink what you’re even allowed to think. It’s the kind of book that makes you pause mid-page because you realize you’ve seen versions of these tactics in real life, just packaged differently. The last time I reread it was 2016, and even then it felt painfully relevant. Honestly, it still is. It’s not an “enjoyable” read in a cozy way, but it’s absolutely a necessary one. Poignant, disturbing, and unforgettable.

Natalija

depiction of what could've happened if the government succeeded in gaslighting and manipulating their people. 

1984, published in 1949, is a dystopian and satirical novel. It revolves around Winston Smith, who lives in a nation called Oceania, in a province called Airstrip One, which represents present-day England. This state is controlled by the Party, headed by a mysterious leader who is addressed as Emmanuel Goldstein, also known as the Big Brother. The Party watches every single move that Smith and other citizens make. The nation's language and history is forcefully changed for the benefit of the Party. A new language, Newspeak, is being compulsively implemented to ensure works that have anything to do with political rebellion are omitted. In Oceania, even rebellious thoughts are illegal and are said to be the worst of all crimes. The people are suppressed and any form of individuality is not tolerated, including love and sex. Smith works as a low-ranking member of the Party who alters historical records. He hates the Party and thus buys an illegal diary in which he pens down his thoughts. He meets Julia, a coworker, who seems to been romantically inclined towards him. He however doubts that she is a Party spy who will get him imprisoned for his 'thoughtcrimes'. Her love turns out to be true and they have a covert affair. Smith's hatred for the Party grows day by day and he is convinced that a powerful Party official O'Brien is actually trying to overthrow the present government with the help of a secret group named the Brotherhood. As the story goes on, readers learn the twists and turns that life in Oceania has in store for Smith. He faces terror, betrayal, freedom, and a broken spirit. 1984 is the author's haunting vision of the future. The book has been adapted into television programmes, films, radio broadcasts and plays. In 2003, the book was number 8 on BBC's survey The Big Read. It was 6th and 13th on the reader's and editor's list of Modern Library 100 Best Novels, respectively. In 2005, it was added to the 100 Best English Language Novel from 1923 to 2005 by TIME magazine. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Eric Arthur Blair, better known by his pen name George Orwell (1903-1950), was an English author and journalist. His work is marked by keen intelligence and wit, a profound awareness of social injustice, an intense opposition to totalitarianism, a passion for clarity in language, and a belief in democratic socialism. In addition to his literary career Orwell served as a police officer with the Indian Imperial Police in Burma from 1922-1927 and fought with the Republicans in the Spanish Civil War from 1936-1937. He was severely wounded when he was shot through his throat. Orwell and his wife were accused of 'Rabid Trotskyism' and tried in absentia in Barcelona, along with other leaders of the POUM, in 1938. However by then they had escaped from Spain and returned to England. Between 1941 and 1943, Orwell worked on propaganda for the BBC. In 1943, he became literary editor of the Tribune, a weekly left-wing magazine. He was a prolific polemical journalist, article writer, literary critic, reviewer, poet and writer of fiction, and considered perhaps the twentieth century's best chronicler of English culture. Orwell is best known for the dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (published in 1949) and the satirical novella Animal Farm (1945)-they have together sold more copies than any two books by any other twentieth-century author. His 1938 book Homage to Catalonia, an account of his experiences as a volunteer on the Republican side during the Spanish Civil War, together with numerous essays on politics, literature, language, and culture, are widely acclaimed. In 2008, The Times ranked him second on a list of 'The 50 greatest British writers since 1945'.

Soph

Library Edition

Nineteen Eighty-Four

Rushikesh Gaikwad

Parts in 1984 that stood out to me and gave me Deja Vu:

"It was always at night--the arrests invariably happened at night. The sudden jerk out of sleep, the rough hand shaking your shoulder, the lights glaring in your eyes, the ring of hard faces round the bed. In the vast majority of cases there was no trial, no report of the arrest. People simply disappeared, always during the night. Your name was removed from the registers, every record of everything you had ever done was wiped out, your one-time existence was denied and then forgotten. You were abolished, annihilated: vaporized was the usual word. (From Chapter 1 of Part 1).

"6079 Smith W! Yes, you! Bend lower, please! You can do better than that. You're not trying. Lower, please! That's better, comrade. Now stand at ease, the whole squad, and watch me!" (From Chapter 3 of Part 1)

"The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command." (Chapter 7, Part 1)

The entire passage about the Inner Party is important but i want to focus on "The two aims of the Party are to conquer the whole surface of the earth and to extinguish once and for all the possibility of independent thought." (Chapter 9, Part 2)

" 'Down with Big Brother!' Yes, I said that! Said it over and over again, it seems. Between you and me, old man, I'm glad they got me before it went any further. Do you know what I'm going to say to them when I go up before the tribunal? 'Thank you,' I'm going to say, 'thank you for saving my before it was too late.' "

"It was my little daughter," said Parsons with a sort of doleful pride."

Susan

Parts in 1984 that stood out to me and gave me Deja Vu:

"It was always at night--the arrests invariably happened at night. The sudden jerk out of sleep, the rough hand shaking your shoulder, the lights glaring in your eyes, the ring of hard faces round the bed. In the vast majority of cases there was no trial, no report of the arrest. People simply disappeared, always during the night. Your name was removed from the registers, every record of everything you had ever done was wiped out, your one-time existence was denied and then forgotten. You were abolished, annihilated: vaporized was the usual word. (From Chapter 1 of Part 1).

"6079 Smith W! Yes, you! Bend lower, please! You can do better than that. You're not trying. Lower, please! That's better, comrade. Now stand at ease, the whole squad, and watch me!" (From Chapter 3 of Part 1)

"The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command." (Chapter 7, Part 1)

The entire passage about the Inner Party is important but i want to focus on "The two aims of the Party are to conquer the whole surface of the earth and to extinguish once and for all the possibility of independent thought." (Chapter 9, Part 2)

" 'Down with Big Brother!' Yes, I said that! Said it over and over again, it seems. Between you and me, old man, I'm glad they got me before it went any further. Do you know what I'm going to say to them when I go up before the tribunal? 'Thank you,' I'm going to say, 'thank you for saving my before it was too late.' "

"Who denounced you?" said Winston.

"It was my little daughter," said Parsons with a sort of doleful pride."

(Chapter 1, Part 3)

I’m starting to realise the classics are classic for a reason lol 

amy isabella

One of the most unforgettable allegories of all time. The blackest mirror a reader will ever peer into.

Blake Dickson

I know a sound is still a sound around no one

I didn’t live through 1984, but somehow… it feels like I’m living 

 it. Surveillance, manipulation, thought control, things that once felt distant now feel eerily familiar. It’s not just a book about a dystopia.

It’s a manual the world seems to be quietly following, one update at a time.

Tanishq Khandelwal

I didn’t live through 1984, but somehow… it feels like I’m living in it. Surveillance, manipulation, thought control, things that once felt distant now feel eerily familiar. It’s not just a book about a dystopia.
It’s a manual the world seems to be quietly following, one update at a time.

The way this world is built, described and live in has not left me, absolute classic

Sam Uhe

Pedro Teixeira

1984 is undoubtedly my favorite book. It leaves me speechless every time I read it, and the story still resonates with current events. A timeless book.

Sherilyn Bourillon 

gishelle

How can one come up with such a plot? It’s literally insane to me how George Orwell just sat down and started coming up with this insane world with a whole new language, system, behaviours and words and it all makes so much sense and no sense at all, all at the same time. It’s literally insane. And then the fact that our main character is literally a prick, a weirdo, high key evil and has some… interesting thoughts but even towards the end I just feel sick for him. It’s so crazy. The party are mad. The proles are lowkey living life. The outer party are literally all brainwashed it’s insane. O’Brien is actually an opp. This book was a great commentary on social society, and how our world conforms to the plot of this book today. 

surtified™

How can one come up with such a plot? It’s literally insane to me how George Orwell just sat down and started coming up with this insane world with a whole new language, system, behaviours and words and it all makes so much sense and no sense at all, all at the same time. It’s literally insane. And then the fact that our main character is literally a prick, a weirdo, high key evil and has some… interesting thoughts but even towards the end I just feel sick for him. It’s so crazy. The party are mad. The proles are lowkey living life. The outer party are literally all brainwashed it’s insane. O’Brien is actually an opp. This book was a great commentary on social society, and how our world conforms to the plot of this book today. 

Crazy. Book. Would recommend. 

um livro ok, enrolado em muitos momentos e começa a ficar interessante mais pro final 

camile

This story highlights the bleak reality of totalitarian regimes and how easily they can infiltrate the minds of their citizens. People don’t like to believe they’re as susceptible as they are, but throughout history — and even today — we see the systematic efforts government forces put into controlling the population and how effective it is. It’s unfortunate that this story is still as relevant as it is today. There’s strong imagery of both rebellion and what happens when people are broken down by the system, and while I found myself annoyed at the characters throughout the story, I understand their actions. To me, Winston is a very unlikable man, but I still found myself sympathetic to aspects of his story.

Overall, I enjoyed this a lot. I just wish some of the pacing was different, and there was a section where my engagement with the text started to wane, disrupting my focus.

Nik ✨

This story highlights the bleak reality of totalitarian regimes and how easily they can infiltrate the minds of their citizens. People don’t like to believe they’re as susceptible as they are, but throughout history — and even today — we see the systematic efforts government forces put into controlling the population and how effective it is. It’s unfortunate that this story is still as relevant as it is today. There’s strong imagery of both rebellion and what happens when people are broken down by the system, and while I found myself annoyed at the characters throughout the story, I understand their actions. To me, Winston is a very unlikable man, but I still found myself sympathetic to aspects of his story.

Overall, I enjoyed this a lot. I just wish some of the pacing was different, and there was a section where my engagement with the text started to wane, disrupting my focus.

I need a moment of silence and peace after this please

Agnese

Ani Velasquez

incredible book, renewed my love for reading and books, got me thinking deeply about our current relationship with surveillance and media, as well as where society is heading for in the future.

1984 - George Orwell

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