1984 George Orwell Truth Analysis

Correspondence Theory, developed in the early twentieth century, asserts that a belief in truth is based on true facts, aligning with a modern understanding of the word ‘truth’. Surely, one does not initially associate the universe of George Orwell’s 1984 with the idea of truth. Winston Smith, the protagonist of the novel, works in the records department of the Ministry of Truth, where he rewrites the past to reflect what the Party wants the citizens of Oceania to believe. The irony found in Winston’s career is substantial; Winston is employed to replace the truth he so desperately attempts to discover. However, toward the end of 1984, Winston becomes content with the truth he finds within the party’s teachings, despite questioning these ideas before entering the Ministry of Love. Winston’s acceptance presents the abstruse concept of truth and its defining qualities. While many may argue that the world of 1984 is laden with lies and deceit, the Party creates a new truth by eliminating the past and sculpting it to fit the

Julian Dodd of Oxford University observes that “In the early to mid-twentieth century, a few philosophers began to speak (perhaps unreflectively), not just of propositions being determined as true by how things stand in reality, but of propositions being made true by entities in reality” (Dodd). The world of 1984 contains an ever-changing truth, and this evolution is one of Orwell’s greatest warnings in the novel. David Dwan, author of Truth and Freedom in Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four elaborates on this idea, commenting that “Orwell worried less about local violations of truth tna about the disappearance of the concept of truth altogether. In previous epochs people lied, but at least ‘they believed that “the facts” existed and were more or less discoverable’ (p. 504). Indeed, an acknowledgement of truth was built into the very concept of a lie”