So. 1984. I was forced to read this book for school when I was about fifteen, but I haven't re-read it since, and I forgot what an utterly terrifying book this is. Apocalyptic literature is one of my favorite genres and I've read all the classics in it, but before this re-reading I wouldn't have listed 1984 among my favorites. I liked the book when I read it in school, sure, but I think the first time I read it I was too young to really understand its significance. All I remember from the first time around is being really frustrated by the ending, which made absolutely no sense to me. But now reading from a (slightly) more mature standpoint, I can see that the ending is the real terror of the book. You are confronted on all sides by an insane society, and to retain your own sanity, you must go insane with it. The book is full of paradoxes like this, and that's what makes it so difficult to wrap your head around - that kind of society is so alien towards us, and yet we understand how it could come to be.
I was especially interested in the themes of insanity and relativity in this book, because it's something that comes up a lot both in my studies of neuroscience and religion, especially eastern religions (yes, I have a strange, strange double concentration in biology and religion, something which is great for books like this!) Winston is constantly struggling with the very concept of reality - if something cannot be touched, held, or examined (like the past) is it real? Or is a flawed projection from our own minds? If I say I saw a bluebird on the tree, and you agree that it is there, I accept that the bird was there. However, if five minutes later I ask you about it, and you deny it ever existed, I being to doubt a past that I personally witnessed. If personal past is can be made to seem mutable, impersonal past might as well be a fairy tale. And if I persist in believing the bluebird was there, even if you insist that it was not, then I begin to doubt not only reality, but my very sanity. The incredible loneliness of this "minority of one" - that is the struggle Wilson must face, and ultimately succumbs to.
Orwell's prediction may have been averted (for now) but what he truly succeeds at is the creation of a society which, theoretically, cannot be defeated. I was reading this book and trying desperately to think of a way that resistance could be mounted, humanity regained, any of it, and every time was countered just as Wilson was. The only hope lies in what are sometimes called "human impulses" - that is, to strive for freedom and love and kindness above all things, and to resist the kind of evil perpetuated by the Party on instinct. However, if what the Party is saying is correct, there is no such thing as this base human nature, only an endlessly programmable machine that can be wired to accept power and hate as replacements for softer emotions felt by previous generations. This is another question that science and religion has struggled with - is man the proverbial "black box", who can be broken down and reassembled as easily as a computer, or is there some inherent nobility in him, some remnant of the divine? Orwell seems to take the former viewpoint, but others have not been so pessimistic. You could find plenty of evidence for both sides, but that's a debate for another day.
Whew. Really started to wax poetic there for awhile. God, I miss English classes. In summary: 1984 is brilliant and bleak and terrifying and let us all be happy that we do not live in an insane totalitarian universe where our government wants to stick people's heads in rat cages. Or do we? Hmmm.....
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