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Jeanette Winterson.

SEMINAR 10

POST-POST MODERN LITERATURE

G. Orwell “1984”; J. Winterson “The Passion”

& Read:

G. Orwell “1984”

J. Winterson “The Passion”

! Write:

Ñreate a constitution or bill of rights for the Brotherhood. Include rules, constraints and rights.

 

 

Give a dramatic reading of a scene from Part One

1. The historical background.Study the information about the special features of post-post modern literature.

George Orwell.

Study the biography of G. Orwell. Be ready to answer the questions on his biography.

3. "1984".

3.1. Think over the following questions concerning the content:

3.1.1. What is the setting of the novel? What does the opening sentence suggest about the book (“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.”)

 

3.1.2. What is a totalitarian regime? How does such a regime attain, maintain, and increase power? What is its main concern? How does it compare with other political structures? Democracy, for example?

 

3.1.3. What role does technology play in this book? In what ways does the Party employ technology? In what ways does technology make the overall themes of this book possible?

3.1.4. Take a look at the three slogans of the Party “WAR IS PEACE. FREEDOM IS SLAVERY. IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.” What role do these contradictions serve within the framework of Doublethink? How does Doublethink satisfy the needs of The Party?

 

 

3.1.5. In the afterword, the commentator describes 1984 as "a warning." Indeed, throughout the text, Orwell plants both subtle and overt warnings to the reader. What do you think are some of the larger issues at hand here?

 

3.2. Read aloud the passages from chapter 3 and be ready to comment on the message G. Orwell suggested:

1) “He (Winston) could not remember what had happened, but he knew in his dream that in some way the lives of his mother and his sister had been sacrificed to his own. It was one of those dreams which, while retaining the characteristic dream scenery, are a continuation of one's intellectual life, and in which one becomes aware of facts and ideas which still seem new and valuable after one is awake. The thing that now suddenly struck Winston was that his mother's death, nearly thirty years ago, had been tragic and sorrowful in a way that was no longer possible. Tragedy, he perceived, belonged to the ancient time, to a time when there was still privacy, love, and friendship, and when the members of a family stood by one another without needing to know the reason. His mother's memory tore at his heart because she had died loving him, when he was too young and selfish to love her in return, and because somehow, he did not remember how, she had sacrificed herself to a conception of loyalty that was private and unalterable. Such things, he saw, could not happen today. Today there were fear, hatred, and pain, but no dignity of emotion, no deep or complex sorrows. All this he seemed to see in the large eyes of his mother and his sister, looking up at him through the green water, hundreds of fathoms down and still sinking.”



 

2) “Since about that time, war had been literally continuous, though strictly speaking it had not always been the same war. For several months during his childhood there had been confused street fighting in London itself, some of which he remembered vividly. But to trace out the history of the whole period, to say who was fighting whom at any given moment, would have been utterly impossible, since no written record, and no spoken word, ever made mention of any other alignment than the existing one. At this moment, for example, in 1984 (if it was 1984), Oceania was at war with Eurasia and in alliance with Eastasia. In no public or private utterance was it ever admitted that the three powers had at any time been grouped along different lines. Actually, as Winston well knew, it was only four years since Oceania had been at war with Eastasia and in alliance with Eurasia. But that was merely a piece of furtive knowledge which he happened to possess because his memory was not satisfactorily under control. Officially the change of partners had never happened. Oceania was at war with Eurasia: therefore Oceania had always been at war with Eurasia. The enemy of the moment always represented absolute evil, and it followed that any past or future agreement with him was impossible.

…the frightening thing was that it might all be true. If the Party could thrust its hand into the past and say of this or that event, it never happened - that, surely, was more terrifying than mere torture and death?

The Party said that Oceania had never been in alliance with Eurasia. He, Winston Smith, knew that Oceania had been in alliance with Eurasia as short a time as four years ago. But where did that knowledge exist? Only in his own consciousness, which in any case must soon be annihilated. And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed -if all records told the same tale -- then the lie passed into history and became truth. 'Who controls the past,' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.' And yet the past, though of its nature alterable, never had been altered. Whatever was true now was true from everlasting to everlasting. It was quite simple. All that was needed was an unending series of victories over your own memory. 'Reality control', they called it: in Newspeak, 'doublethink'.”

 

Winston Smith.

3.3.1. What do you know about Winston Smith’s age, occupation, and abilities?

Taking into consideration that the name “Winston” means “from a friendly country” and “Smith” is a common last name, what can his name suggest? What is the irony suggested by the name?

3.3.2. How do Big Brother or Emmanuel Goldstein affect Winston?

 

Julia

3.4.1. From her first appearance as "the dark-haired girl," through to the end of the novel, Julia is a key figure in 1984. Trace the path of Julia in relation to Winston's life; in what ways does she influence him? Did you trust her, initially? Overall, do you feel she had a positive or negative impact upon him?

3.4.2. Explain in what ways Julia differs from Winston. Consider her behavior, her motivation, and her goals.

Jeanette Winterson.

Study the biography of J. Winterson. Be ready to answer the questions on her biography.

5. "The Passion".

Read the novel and be ready to discuss it.

 

Sources Quoted:

1. http://www.penguin.com/static/pdf/teachersguides/1984.pdf

2. http://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/n/1984/study-help/essay-questions

3. http://www.shmoop.com/1984/questions.html

4. http://www.litlovers.com/reading-guides/13-fiction/746-1984-orwell?start=3


Date: 2016-01-14; view: 1240


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