Alexandra Strapko
Professor Siewers
ENLS 245: Terror with a Human Face
February 28, 2022
The sterile cage was closing in, the ravenous creatures were scraping at the metal rungs, craving the smell of any semblance of fresh meat, ready to charge the moment the cage door opened. He was past the cross-roads in his mind, he had taken the leap toward self-preservation; “Do it to Julia! Do not release them unto me! Do it to Julia instead of me!”. Still feeling the cold wire against his cheek and smelling the sour breath of the rodents, he heard the click of the wire cage door closing shut, leaving him cowering in the dark room as though the room had just caved in, utterly alone. In 1984, Winston’s initial view toward relationships with family, women and peers is overshadowed by guilt, hate and indifference instilled in him by the Party, therefore, expressing the totalitarian aspect of isolationism, or atomization as Hannah Arendt defines it in her philosophical work Origins of Totalitarianism, a totally immersive society of loneliness that enables the replacement of all human connection with a universal ideology. Big Brother’s main goal is to prevent its Party members from forming closer bonds with one another than their loyalty to the Party itself. This mentality is engrained into its members to perpetuate fear within society to “survive at any price”, as Alexander Solzhenitsyn described it, guaranteeing your own survival through sacrifice of others to satisfy the needs of the Party. In today’s COVID ridden world, we are isolated from one another in fear of spreading a virus, incapable of being eradicated even with modern medicine, that cost the population their close ties to family and friends due to public health precautions.
As he woke with tears in his eyes, still feeling the remnants of his dream, the sticky chocolate in his hand, his sister’s wail, and his mother’s eyes: he was to blame for their vaporization. Winston’s preliminary reservation to form close relationships stems from his guilt regarding his mother and sister’s disappearance, therefore, furthering his isolation from all members of society. Winston in his adolescence during war time, constantly at odds with his mother over the shortage of food, had grown impatient with poverty. Orwell, after visiting Burma as an imperial policeman, was deeply interested in helping the poor and delving into the perspectives of those people who suffered most from an oppressive government power (Agathocleous 23). Orwell’s rebellion of British Imperialism and sympathy for the under privileged is expressed through Winston’s upbringing in a poor household and the challenges they faced emotionally and physically.
As a young boy of only ten or twelve years, selfishness is an inevitable consequence of all young children but should be taught to control. His mother acknowledged he, being “the boy” of the house, should have the largest portion yet no matter how much she gave him he still demanded more of her (Orwell 143). He knew his baby sister was sick and something, of which they never outwardly spoke, was going to happen to his mother; yet he persisted in taking what he believed he deserved to satisfy his needs above all else. Winston consciously starved his family, but he could not help the hunger he felt in his belly and the feeling that he had a right to take what he desired, for his own personal gain (Orwell 144). This greed is preyed upon by Big Brother, and clearly indicative of a totalitarian culture, for the maintenance of individualism in society. Humans are selfish in their primal state, it is in their nature to preserve themselves at all costs. Greed and selfishness are the core of totalitarian regimes that is nurtured within the young to perpetuate it through adulthood and for generations.
Works Cited
- Agathocleous, Tanya. George Orwell : Battling Big Brother, Oxford University Press, Incorporated, 2000. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/bucknell/detail.action?docID=5763586.
- Orwell, George. 1984: A Novel. Berkley, 2017.