1984's Outcome by Malcolm

1984's Outcome by Malcolm - May 2017 Scholarship Essay

If there were to be one book that brewed change in my life, it would be “1984” by George Orwell. Not only does the book give us a taste of how we don’t want the world to be given the circumstances, but it also makes us think about how today’s world is almost as Orwell predicted.
If one book can alter one’s life and mind, 1984 would be that book. It takes place in April of 1984. Our main character, Winston, is unaware of exactly what day it is. This already foreshadows the government manipulation just by time alone. We go through Winston’s job, which is revising historical records or changing history itself (now we know, for sure, that the government has just a little bit of an influence on how the world is), and he goes on to explain how the world is ran. A dictatorship, or English socialism (as the book calls it), is what is set in play in a super-state known as “Oceania”. Oceania is one of the three inter-continental super-states that divided the world after a massive global war. A person, who the people refer to as “Big Brother”, rules over Oceania with a tight grip. He puts “tele-screens” that watch over people in every house, punishes one for even thinking bad about him and his methods (which is called thought-crime), and will “vaporize”, or remove one from existence after killing them, for doing what he says is wrong. There are police, who are called “Thought-Police”, and a group that is in charge. This group is called “The Party”. There is also an opposing group to The Party. This group is called “The Brotherhood”. The Brotherhood goes and finds out how the Party operates and plans to take them down (or so we think). The English language has even been modified so that one word can mean a variety of things. This new language is called “Newspeak” and the older English is called “Old-speak”. The story goes through Winston’s life, and how he goes about attempting to plot against Big Brother and his ways. It shows how power seems to grow, not lessen.
I find that this book influences how I am mentally and how I see my surroundings because it affected me young. I came along this book in the 7th or 8th grade, sitting in the library. The book got my attention, because it was just a year on a book. No words or fancy pictures to get my attention. I read it once and didn’t really like it because I didn’t get what the book was trying to say. I later had the read is for a summer reading assignment my sophomore year in high school. After the second reading, I understood what the book is trying to say. I then looked at how the world is slowly becoming the way that Orwell imagined. Technology is at its peak, and power is one thing that people can’t get enough of. All that has to happen is one person to think of a method for the government to make orders through the screens, and we’re already in motion. I used to think that having all these cameras and big television screens were cool and everyone should have them, but after reading 1984 my 10th grade year, it changed how I thought of it all. We can easily become the “negative utopia” that everyone despises from the items that we want in our perfect utopia. Without reading 1984, I probably wouldn’t have ever thought of things like such.