1984 BOOK DISCUSSION

Hi there, Spirits!  Great meeting today at the Lodge.  I have finally recovered enough from this book and play to finally do the blog review!  Let's hope blogging about it doesn't give me flashbacks to the depression I suffered after finishing this book.

 Indy recommended a Vanity Fair article about the author, George Orwell, which gave her some insight about the author of this soul crushing book.  From there, Baron led us off with some though-provoking discussion topics.  The first launched right into the heart of the debate by asking whether we believe the government should restrict personal freedoms to decrease violence?  The consensus of the group was that we would prefer more freedom, but less security.  However, at least in the context of 1984, I thought this was a false dichotomy, because the society was still violent, the only change was the direction of violence.  Instead of the citizens being violent toward each other, the government was violent toward the citizens to "keep them in line."

Someone made the observation that in some ways it would have been better to have been a "prole," since they at least had their humanity and feelings.  Winston believed the proles were the only hope for society, while O'Brien said they would never revolt.  These aren't necessarily mutually exclusive ideas, but I believe the consensus was that an uprising was inevitable.

A central theme of the book is the constant surveillance.  Indy commented about having worked in a position in which she was constantly on camera, and how uncomfortable it made her.  Likewise, Cat had experienced a similar situation where her emails and phone calls were monitored by her employer.  Baron said that it brought to mind the scene from The Book Thief, when the father slapped the little girl for saying something negative about Hitler - it was forbidden to even think forbidden thoughts.

Another theme in the book was Newspeak and the elimination of language.  For most of us, this was a horrific thought, especially because the purpose of eliminating language was to eliminate thoughts.  Baron, who recently read Brave New World, remarked that in that book, there was information overload, which achieved the same end of preventing intelligent thought.  Cat commented that the "mind control" element brought to mind one of Chief's books, The Capture (the one about owls).

We discussed the use of doublethink throughout the book, and I hope I wasn't the only Spirit who struggled to comprehend the contradictions.  The book explained how "war is peace," in that the country united against external forces and the people were all kept busy.  Meanwhile the three major countries could never do more than skirmish with each other for some outlying territories.

Eventually we got around to Room 101.  Cat commented that the concept reminded her of Boggarts (a creature in Harry Potter that turns into the thing you fear most), and Indy noted that some hotels had no Room 101 due to the book.  I, for one, was really disturbed by wondering whether I would sacrifice my loved ones if I was faced with my worst fear.  To be fair, though, it didn't really seem like what Julia and Winston had was really "love."  Still, it was disturbing that the one thing he thought Big Brother could not take away from him, the way he felt for her, was taken in the end.

Overall, 1984 got high marks all around, with 3 being its lowest mark (from Deuce) and 5 being its highest (from Baron and Cat).  This was an impressive book, if for nothing else, for its foresight of the potential dangers of technology.  It was very well written and full of insights.  However, as we concluded at the end of our meeting: "but DANG."

I hope this blog post doesn't trigger the nightmares!  Sorry for the long delay in completing this blog entry.  Until next time!