1984 Post #2

Welcome to my second blog post for 1984! I have recently read from page 201 to 326. Since I have now finished 1984, I would like to comment on the overall theme of the novel. But first of all, it is important to note that there is no novel in the world that has only one, absolute theme, and I think that this book is no exception. Just because my idea of the theme is different from your idea does not mean that you are necessarily incorrect. With that said, I hope you enjoy reading this post.

If someone asked me to come up with a theme statement for the novel 1984, I would most definitely say that the theme statement is: "Power in the wrong hands can be devastating." This is the major theme of the novel because the Party (the group that controls Oceania), especially the Inner Party, has an enormous amount of power, but it uses that power for its own means. Because this is happening, the entire society of Oceania (one of the three superpowers that exists in the novel) is more or less corrupt. Now, by "corrupt," I don't mean that society isn't allowed to read books (Fahrenheit 451) or that society is full of people that are called by numbers instead of names (We). By "corrupt," I mean that society has lost virtually all of its freedom. I will elaborate a bit further in order to give you a better picture of the situation.

Imagine a world where you are constantly being watched. When you wake up, you must exercise, or you'll be punished. You have to go to work every day at the same exact time. You cannot say anything negative about the Party, or you will definitely be "re-educated." You cannot marry anybody without the Party's permission, and even then, you cannot marry for love. Everything you say or do is noticed by the government through special "telescreens," which are devices that both receive and give information, enabling the government to feed you propaganda while keeping an eye on you at the same time.

Not only this, but you are also constantly being fed lies every single day. The government tells you that your nation has been at war with Eurasia since the very beginning, even though you've been told just the day before that your nation has been at war with Eastasia. The government tells you that the chocolate ration has increased by ten grams, even though you know for a fact that it actually decreased. The government tells you that two and two make five, and even though you know that this is not the case, you are expected to believe it or suffer the consequences.

This is the dystopia of 1984. After reading up to this point, I am sure you'll agree with me that the dystopia featured in the novel is very much corrupt. The reason for this is because of "power (being) in the wrong hands." In 1984, there are three groups of people: the Inner Party members, the Outer Party members, and the proletarians, otherwise known as the proles. Most of the power belongs to the Inner Party, which is a small group of elites who make up only two percent of the population. Even though the Inner Party has so much power that could be used to increase the quality of life of Oceania's citizens, it instead uses this power to make sure that the Inner Party keeps that power forever, through the construction of devices such as telescreens, in order to make sure that there is no rebellion. This immoral application of power resulted in the entire dystopia of 1984, which is why I believe that the theme statement of 1984 is: "Power in the wrong hands can be devastating."

Thank you for reading my second post for 1984.