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Winston Smith- In Chapter 2 Winston is
engaged in a conflict with himself. As we know
from previous chapters Winston has always
prided himself upon his morals and ability to
recollect the actual past. Now as he spends his
days, in what appears to be the Ministry of
Love, Winston is broken down as he is ripped
apart from the morals he has built himself
upon.
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Orwell does not use direct characterization in this chapter because
all the information we gather about Winston is from how he
responds to O’Brien’s torture.
“Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only
gradually.”
-When humans are excited by their new surroundings they
usually scan their environment with a sense of urgency, the
absence of urgency in Winston’s behavior shows his fear and
uncertainty triggered by his new environment.
“Everything was all right, there was no more pain, the last detail
of his life was laid bare, understood, forgiven.”
-This quote is the first time Winston had no longer feared death
because he felt it to be an obligatory punishment he would
receive. Winston almost feels a sense of pride that he was going to
become a martyr for his beliefs that were unable to be changed.
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“You would not make the act of submission which is
the price of sanity. You preferred to be a lunatic, a
minority of one.”
-O’Brien shows us that Winston’s inability to lie to himself was his
eventual downfall as he needed to lie himself to fit the
government standard of sane. He goes on to say how Winston is a
minority of one showing Winston’s incapacity to make a change in
their society.
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O’Brien- Winston finds out in chapter two that
O’Brien set him up and the conspiracy against the
party was an attempt to expose Winston's lack of
allegiance to the party. Although O’Brien is the
apparent ringleader to Winston’s suffering, Winston
feels a sense of loyalty to O’Brien because he is the
only party member of‘Miniluv’ that Winston is
familiar with. At one point Winston actually wrote
in his dairy, “that it did not matter whether
I(O’Brien) was a friend or an enemy, since I was at
least a person who understood you and could be
talked to.”
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Julia- Although Julia makes no appearance in
this chapter the first question Winston asked is
about her safety. O’Brien tells Winston that she
betrayed him immediately, without guilt.
Although it seems that this would be a
devastation to Winston, O’Brien is not a very
reliable source at this point in time.
 Newspeak/Vocabulary
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Erroneous (adj)- straying from what is moral, decent,
proper, etc.
-”It is intolerable to us that an erroneous thought
should exist anywhere in the world, however secret
and powerless it may be.”
Heretic (n)-a professed believer who maintains
religious opinions contrary to those accepted by his or
her church or rejects doctrines prescribed by that
church.
-”In the old days the heretic walked to the stake still a
heretic, proclaiming his heresy, exulting in it.”
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Lunacy (n)-insanity; mental disorder.
-”O’Brien had tortured him to the edge of
lunacy, and in a little while, it was certain, he
would send him to his death.”
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-Orwell’s writing style in this chapter varied to
express a variety of moods. The sentences start off
lengthy but taper off as the suspense dies down.
The long sentences did a excellent job to build the
tangible suspense the reader experiences.
-The tone of this chapter is very suspenseful
because the author has built up many possible
scenarios for Winston but has not hinted toward
any of them. Orwell’s technique is very effective
because it provokes the readers to continue on to
unravel Winston’s fate.
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-The author choosing to write this book
in third-person limited really put a touch
on this chapter. If the reader now
understood the thoughts of the party the
suspense would not have mounted and it
would be only Winston who did not
know his fate.
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“There were times when he rolled about the
floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless
effort to dodge the kicks, and simply inviting
more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his
belly, on his elbows, on his shins, in his groin,
in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his
spine.”
-This sentence demonstrates multiple literary
elements. First it uses personification
comparing Winston to an animal, and then it
goes onto use imagery giving the reader a
picture of how Winston responded to the
violence.
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“He felt very cold, he was shaking uncontrollably, his
teeth were chattering, the tears were rolling down his
cheeks.”
-This quote was extracted from the paragraph
following Winston’s torture. The imagery is effectively
used to portray the vulnerable state that O’Brien has
left Winston in.
“For a moment he had clung to O’Brien like a baby..”
-This simile coincides with the previous quote to show
the state Winston is left in. Winston’s comparison to a
baby shows us his fear and insecurity he feels
regarding his suffering and the future.
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“Their real weapon was the merciless
questioning..”
-This hyperbole is used to exaggerate the toll
that the questioning took on Winston, their real
weapon as we read was violence. It is also used
to show the ruthlessness of the questioning the
violators endure.
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What does Winston make of the fact that Julia
has supposedly betrayed him?
Winston doesn’t pay much attention to it as he
has more troublesome issues of his own to
attend to. Also Winston doesn’t want to
speculate information that may or may not be
accurate.
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Why does Winston feel as if O’Brien is his
protector?
Although O’Brien is inflicting the torture
tactics, he is also the one who seizes them.
Winston feels as if the party is inflicting the
pain, not O’Brien, resulting in a lack of hardfeelings toward O’Brien.
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Has Winston’s intelligence contributed to his
series of unfortunate events?
Yes, Winston’s intelligence encouraged him to
commit to the underground movement scam.
Even once Winston is captured and
interrogated he refuses to accept the party’s
facts about war with Eurasia and Eastasia, and
that O’Brien’s four fingers are accepted as
“five”. Winston will not accept the fact that
O’Brien is holding up “five” fingers because he
said in a previous chapter the government will
have complete control when they convince
people that 2+2=5.
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What does O’Brien think of Winston?
O’Brien is surprisingly fond of Winston,
he even said Winston’s mind appealed to him,
especially his memory and ability to recall
historical events, such as the photograph of
Rutherford in New York. O’Brien views his
mind to be modeled after Winston’s, with the
exception of Winston’s being “insane”.
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Does Winston agree with the accusations of
him being mentally insane?
Yes… and no. Winston believes he fits the
governments standards of insanity which
derives basically from insubordination towards
the party. Winston also believes he is not
insane in a literal sense because he is able to
interpret situations and reason better than his
fellow comrades.
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In this chapter Winston starts out in a group
cell where he is left with nothing to do except
predict his future torture. Winston becomes
restless, as the telescreens on the wall monitor
his every movement. Winston goes through
periods of his hunger pangs where all he can
think about is his pursuit of a meal, and when
the pangs seize his mind cannot drift from the
thoughts of his future torture. Eventually a
group of men come for Winston and put him
through a rigorous series of beatings,
questioning, and sleep deprivation. As
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Winston mentally and physically tires the
beatings seize and are used as more of a threat
than anything else. Next, O’Brien subjects
Winston to a machine in which Winston is tied
down at the limbs and subject to electrical
impulses being pumped through his body.
Winston feels as if this treatments continues he
would much rather be dead. At the end of
Winston’s final session O’Brien gives Winston
an attempt to gather any information he
sought. Winston asking about Julia shows his
loyalty, but Orwell once again arises suspense
with Winston’s next question.
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When Winston asked O’Brien what Room 101
is, O’Brien simply told Winston that everyone
knows what Room 101 is. From previous
knowledge of the man who begged to be
spared from Room 101 we can assume that it is
not only a gruesome torture, but the destiny of
those who enter is death.