“The Book”

Superstates Eurasia: Russia, N. Europe, Asiatic land mass Oceania: British, U.S., Americas, British Isles, Australia, Southern Part of Africa Eastasia: China and S. Japanese Islands, Manchuria, Mongolia, Tibet

Information about Superstates No superstate can be definitively conquered by others 25 years of war since after the Atomic Explosion in the 50’s No material cause to fight No ideological differences War hysteria is continuous Fighting only takes place on frontiers or Floating Fortresses which guard sea lanes

Why War? War is about control of the workforce which comprises 1/5 of the population of the earth Disputed areas contain valuable minerals Bottomless reserve of cheap labor People were treated as slaves What they produce is not necessarily needed Primary aim is to use up the products of the machine without raising the standard of living

Background Technological advancement stopped because of impoverishment caused by a long series of wars and revolutions Advancement also stopped because progress depended on freedom of thought which can’t exist in a strictly regimented society World is more primitive in 1984 than it was 50 years prior Atomic war was in the 1950’s

Background After the 1950’s, there was an all around increase in wealth which threatened the destruction of hierarchical society If everyone who was normally stupefied by poverty would become literate and would learn to think for themselves Hierarchy is only possible on a basis of poverty and ignorance Goods must be produced but they need not be distributed. Keep industrial wheels turning without increasing the wealth of the world

Essential Act of War Destruction of products of human labor which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable and too intelligent War effort is planned as to eat up any surplus that might exist after meeting the base needs of the population (158) The needs of the population are always underestimated = shortage = hardship = importance of small privileges magnifies the distinction between one group and another

Party Members Must be… Competent Intelligent Ignorant Hatred Triumph Industrious Credulous Fearful Adulation

Inner Party War hysteria and hatred of the enemy are strongest May need to know that there are some untruths but they have a mystical belief that war is real

Science No longer truly exists Empirical thought contradicts Ingsoc Science is only useful when it helps to decrease human dignity and liberty

Aims of the Party Conquer the whole surface of the earth Extinguish once and for all the possibility of independent thought

Problems the Party Has to Solve How to discover, against his will, what another human being is thinking How to kill several hundred million people in a few seconds without giving warning before hand Each super country has access to an atomic bomb

Goals of War Through fighting, bargaining, well-tied strokes of treasury to acquire a ring of bases completely encircling one or another of the rival states and then sign a pact of friendship with that rival and remain on peaceful terms for so many years as to lull suspicion to sleep Will eventually fire atom bombs simultaneously to make retaliation impossible

Citizens should never see foreigners because if he did he would discover creatures similar to himself and discover that most of what has been told to him is lies Conditions of life in all 3 superstates are very much the same: Pyramidal structure Worship of semi-divine leader Economy exists

War When war becomes continuous there is no such thing as military necessity Technological progress can cease and the most palpable facts can be denied or disregarded Efficiency is no longer needed. War is a purely internal affair A peace that was truly permanent would be the same as a permanent war

Ignorance is Strength Three main groups: high, middle and low High: goal is to remain where they are Middle: goal is to change places with the high Low: goal is to abolish all distinctions and create a society in which all men are created equal. However, many of the Low people often crushed by drudgery and are unable to see past what is going on every day

New Socialist Movements Oceania: Ingsoc Eurasia: Neo-Bolshevism Eurasia: Death worship All movements have the conscious aim or perpetuating unfreedom and inequality Movements grew out of Socialism and paid lip service to their ideology, but the purpose of all of them was to arrest progress and freeze history at a chosen moment

Utopian Vision Vision that an earthly paradise in which all men should live together in a state of brotherhood, without laws and without brute labor, had haunted the human imagination for thousands of years. But by the 1940’s all main currents of political thought were authoritarian Every new political theory led back to hierarchy and regimentation Practices which had been long abandoned (imprisonment without trial, use of war prisoners as slaves) became common again

All tyrannies of the past were half-hearted and inefficient Ruling groups were always infected to some extent by liberal ideas and were content to leave loose ends everywhere Invention of print made it easier to manipulate public opinion and the film and radio carried the process further. Development of television caused private life to end. Every citizen could be kept for 24 hours a day under the eyes of the police and in the sound of official propaganda

New Social Hierarchy High group realized that they could only maintain their status through oligarchy and collectivism Abolition of private property Individually, no member of the Party owns anything Collectively, the Party owns everything in Oceania because it controls everything and disposes of the products as it thinks fit Economic inequality was made permanent

Ways for ruling class to fall from power Conquered from without It governs so inefficiently that the masses are stirred to revolt It allows a strong and discontented Middle group to come into being It loses its own self-confidence and willingness to govern

Structure of Oceania Big Brother: infallible and all powerful. No one has seen him. His function is to act as a focusing point for love, fear and reverence Inner Party; numbers limited to less than 2% of population. The “brains” of the party Outer Party: the “hands” of the party

Education Because the Proles never learn about anything other than the life that they live they are not likely to rebel. They know nothing other than what they are living at present time Proles are granted intellectual liberty b/c they have no intellect Party members must rigidly conform Everything they do or say is always being inspected Any physical manifestations of an inner struggle are all scrutinized

Requirements of Party Members Have no private emotions Live in a continuous frenzy of hatred Any discontent is turned outwards in the Two Minutes Hate Crimestop: stopping yourself before you can even have a negative thought – protective stupidity Doublethink: power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously and accepting both of them. To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing