George Orwell's Totalitarian Government

In the novel 1984, George Orwell shows the reader that the government isn’t always what it sets out to be. In the novel Orwell talks about a totalitarian government that controls the characters were ever they go, such as in their own home. In everyone’s home there are Telescreens, they monitor the characters movements and also record things you say and then they report it back to the Thought Police. Big Brother was also a major part of this novel because his poster was plastered everywhere, and where ever the characters went his eyes where always watching them. Orwell also shows the reader that not only the government, but the people that Winston Smith came in contact with played a major role in his life and the way he lived it. The first

A Totalitarian Government is a government that controls every aspect of one’s life and has one Steigerwalt 2 person as the leader. When someone has a government like that they experience a loss of freedom, individuality, and joy in life. When Orwell was writing this novel he wrote about his firsthand accounts. “Orwell witnessed first-hand the atrocities committed during the Spanish Civil War and lived during the rise to power of dictators such as Hitler and Stalin. These events likely inspired and informed his politically focused novels and hatred of totalitarianism. “In 1984, the government is a pervasive entity both literary and symbolically” (Bauer, page 1). George Orwell’s characters in 1984 depict Stalin, Hitler, and other people that where prominent at that time. The two minutes hate depicted in the novel closely reassembles Stalin’s speeches in the 1940’s, which where all broadcasted on the radio. George Orwell most likely tied in radio propaganda because of his first-hand experience with it. “The “two minute hate” focuses on generating hatred of the enemies of the party, particularly “Goldstein,” a man described as having a “lean Jewish face”. Orwell is clearly paralleling Hitler’s use of the German Jews as the national scapegoat.” (Bauer, Page 2). Orwell wanted to prove that a Totalitarian Government is an evil thing and he wanted his reader’s to see the extend that Winston went through just to fight his