Context

Question 1

George Orwell

Answer 1

real name- Eric Blair

exposed and critiqued the human tendency to oppress others politically, economically and physically

Question 2

best known works

Answer 2

Animal Farm (1945) and 1984 (1949)

both books are considered to be indictments of communism under Stalin, but Orwell insisted they were critiques of totalitarian ideas in general and warned that the conditions he depicted could happen anywhere

Question 3

socialist

Answer 3

a direct result of his military service on the Republican side against Fascist General Franco in the Spanish Civil war

Question 4

influenced by

Answer 4

anarchist critiques of Soviet communism and by Marxist writings of Leon Trotsky, model for Goldstein

Question 5

1946

Answer 5

Orwell wrote:

“every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly, or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I understand it”

Question 6

when written

Answer 6

1945-9

outline written in 1943

Question 7

Published

Answer 7

June 1949

Question 8

Literary period

Answer 8

Late Modernism

Question 9

genre

Answer 9

novel/ satire/ parable

Question 10

setting

Answer 10

london 1984

Question 11

narrator

Answer 11

3rd person omniscient

Question 12

working title

Answer 12

the last man in europe because his ability to think for himself has distinguished him from the world around him

Question 13

the themes

Answer 13

like the threat of totalitarianism, censorship and manipulative language continue to reverberate, with prophetic menace, into the present

Question 14

1984

Answer 14

• possibly inspired by the creation of the fabian society, a socialist org, in 1884
• or perhaps by Jack London’s ‘The Iron Heel’, in which a political movement comes into power in 1984

Question 15

the title

Answer 15

is a political statement, not a prophetic statement

a warning to mankind

Question 16

his warning

Answer 16

3 warring states and BB don’t exist, however, there are two major superpowers, with another on the rise, which seem to divide the world into three zones

Question 17

correction prediction

Answer 17

management of the news, censorship of written and spoken word and governments with the ability to invade individuals privacy

Question 18

1984 and THT

Answer 18

although the two novels are very different in detail and emphasis, they both propagate two dehumanising and unbearably pessimistic dystopian visions. The two novels are cautionary tales, containing warnings for the future.

Question 19

the THT

Answer 19

has been called “a female 1984”

Question 20

links to BNW

Answer 20

both novels were written by authors who’d experienced war on a huge scale in the 20th century

both disillusioned and alarmed by what they saw in society

Question 21

explores 20th cent technology

Answer 21

closed circuit television and information retrieval systems

Question 22

uses english setting

Answer 22

a folk culture - “oranges and lemons” to suggest that it could happen here

Question 23

Stalinist Show-trials and Purges

Answer 23

Jones, Rutherford and Aaronson - He realises that Big Brother and the Party can arrest and break anyone, can falsely accuse anyone and no-one will care

even the inner party is seen as a threat to Big Brother’s supreme Power