Extra Credit Blog 10

1984 by George Orwell takes places in 1984 and is about an imaginary future where a totalitarian state controls every single aspect of life, including what people think. Winston Smith is the protagonist of the novel and works for the state. The fictional state is called Oceania and is ruled by a group of people known as the Party and their dictator is named Big Brother. Smith secretly hates the Party and decides to rebel against them by starting a diary in which he reveals his rebellious thoughts. Since he cannot really think about his thoughts because he could get caught by the thought police he needs to write them down in the diary. Later on in the novel, Smith meets Julia, who also works in the same state department as his. He begins a love affair her but meet secretly because members of the same department cannot be together. Smith meets a man named O'Brien who tricks Smith to find out what he is truly doing behind the Party’s back. When he is caught they end up torturing and brainwashing him until he fully believes in the Party and its doctrines. Smith is forced to betray his love for Julia, and his feelings for her are destroyed. After all of this Smith is released to live out his final days in the state.
I ended up picking this novel because it is describing what the author thought the future would be like when he first published this novel in 1949. Reading about all the different types of literary lenses there are, I thought this book could relate to them. There is not the critical breakdown of what the author has intended in the novel but several character developments and internal dilemmas each character faces.