1984
1984
#01984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 1:50pmWho else read this book? I thought it was insanley creepy but very, very good. The ending I was sort of torn on...I would have liked to see an overthrow of Big Brother, but as it was already stated as a fact in the beginning of the book that he could not then...
Unknown User
Joined: 12/31/69
#2re: 1984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 1:55pmYeah... I love how he explained how the 3..oh what do you call them... countries? continents? worlds? came from all the countries of the world. Dictatorship to the max and all...
Sarah2
Leading Actor Joined: 5/11/05
#3re: 1984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 2:01pmIn my head I had come up with a little list of books I wanted to read this summer, and this one was on the list. Unfortunately, I can be incredibly lazy and many times have decided to go online instead of read. I am definitely going to get around to reading it sometime though; it seems like an interesting book.
#4re: 1984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 2:02pmI read it in 1975, and thought some of the things in there couldn't possibly happen. Who knew.
Our fingerprints don't fade from the lives we touch.
Puppies are babies in fur coats.
Tinfoil...The Terrorizing Terminator
Mamie
Broadway Legend Joined: 3/26/04
Unknown User
Joined: 12/31/69
Unknown User
Joined: 12/31/69
#10re: 1984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 2:39pm
"1984" is not remotely Orwell's vision of what he thought 1984 might look like. The year doesn't mean anything, in fact, it's probably just the year he wrote it, 1948, with the numbers replaced (and the book is also fairly clear that the story does NOT necesarily take place in the year 1984 at all.) It wasn't his intent to write a piece of speculative science fiction, he was writing a satire of his own era.
Given Orwell's less than rosy view of the world in which he lived and the political shapes manipulating it, a 'here we come to save the day' ending would have been the far bigger cop-out.
#11re: 1984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 2:43pm
The ending is anything but a cop-out, to have there be hope in the face of the overwhelming evidence agaist it would be a cop out. It is supposed to make you angry, to make you take action and change things, where it will stop happening. Obviously there was a bit of success and some failure in those ideals over the years since the book was published.
As any good semi-alegorical story it applies both then and now, it is universally applicable and the way it fits the issues of the day is important.
#13re: 1984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 3:16pmThis is one of my all-time favorite books. I have this habit of highlighting any pharases or sections in a book that are particularly thought-provoking or interesting to me. My copy of 1984 is so highlighted it's almost distracting. Great, great book about the dangers of giving up our humanity and giving governments too much power.
Unknown User
Joined: 12/31/69
#16re: 1984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 3:52pm
Who was it that told me to watch A Clockwork Orange..it's movie right?
I think Cruel sandwhich..
Cruel_Sandwich
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/30/05
#20re: 1984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 5:56pmWow I feel old! I read it back in '79.
#22re: 1984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 6:39pm
*spoiler (in case someone reading the 1984 thread hasn't actually read 1984)*
smartpenguin, I thought the ending was a cop-out in that I thought the huge revelation of "giving up" Julia over the rats wasn't really that big of a deal. It was just so anticlimactic compared to what had been alluded to the entire book. Then they let him go and make him think he's free only to kill him as soon as he gets out of the building. The whole torture/punishment seemed really mild compared to what the thoughtpolice were really capable of.
Wanting life but never knowing how
#23re: 1984
Posted: 8/30/05 at 6:40pmorangeskittles- EXACTLY what I thought
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