They Can Get Inside You - Essay Example

From the opening chapter of the book, we see that even though Winston has somehow been able to resist and question the party, he still absorbs its influence. As he sits writes in the diary for the first time, he remembers a recent two minutes hate session. Even though the charade of Goldstein and the hate sessions is so "exaggerated and perverse that a child should have been able to see through it" (Orwell 14), Winston is not entirely immune to the emotion it is intended to evoke. He feels the hatred that he is supposed to feel: "the very next instant he was at one with the people around him, andhis secret loathing of Big Brother changed into adoration".

(Orwell 17) His hatred may not be directed at the intended target, but it indicates that Winston, like everyone else, is at the very least susceptible to the party's brainwashing. He feels the hatred, and that is enough: they are inside him. They are inside Julia, too. Julia appears to be a faithful party member, so much so that Winston suspects she is a spy for the Thought Police. Like Winston, she is a secret rebel, but her view of their world is different from Winston's. She is less concerned with ideologies and does not take much interest when Winston theorizes about the nature of the party.

Unlike Winston, who dreams of a different world and a different life, Julia accepts the world as it is, and instead of dreaming, rebels in ways that make her life more bearable. Julia is intelligent but does not think deeply on the corruption within the party and what it means. She accepts the history she was taught in school without question, and does not remember that four years ago the country's enemy was a different one. She is bored and falls asleep when Winston reads to her from Goldstein's book.

All these things indicate that Julia, despite her rebellious nature, is still influenced by the party. They are inside her, because she is "unwilling and unable to think too deeply on any subject whatever", just as she has been taught by the party. (Orwell 220) Winston and Julia both consider themselves intellectually free. They know the party is a lie and they are both against it, though for different reasons. But Julia is wrong when she says the party can't get inside them, and can't influence how they feel.

They don't seem to understand how pervasive the party's influence really is, or perhaps they consider it unimportant because their conscious is free even if their subconscious is not. However when they are caught, they both end up losing that freedom of consciousness, and their loyalty to each other. During his stay in the Ministry of Love, Winston is subjected to mental and physical torture for an undefined length of time. O'Brien shows him that the party control the past and the present and shows him that 2 + 2 = 5 if the party says it does.

Eventually Winston is allowed to physically recover, but during a dream he becomes aware that the party has not penetrated the deepest part of his mind - he still loves Julia, and hates Big Brother. He has tried to "keep the inner heart inviolate" (Orwell 293) and this has caused him to commit thoughtcrime. He decides that the only solution is to suppress his hatred towards the party and Big Brother so that it cannot escape from his subconscious, but instead O'Brien takes him to Room 101. In