Smith in Love Submission and Perversity - Essay Example

SEE WORKS CITED PAGE FOR PERSONAL – TO BE ERASED – S] Smith in Love: and Perversity In romantic literature and poetry the concept of love as the submission of oneself to another is well-known. Perhaps the greatest of all love poets wrote: “Such is my love, to thee I so belong,/ That for thy right myself will bear all wrong.” Shakespeare’s feelings in Sonnet 88 have been echoed by countless authors when they wrote about love. Finding a story about love in the bleak uniformity of George Orwell’s 1984 may seem impossible if not absurd, but such is Orwell’s artistry in his complex creation that a love story exists within the novelist’s dark imagining of a society in which the Individual is expected only to genuflect to what is best for the State. Human beings as individuals have no validity. Feelings and emotions are forbidden. The notion of ‘love’ is laughable: it undermines the State’s power. Winston Smith and Julia know this. They do not accept it, however, but pursue a forbidden relationship; they deny submitting to the State by submitting to each other. In doing so they create a form of love that is traditional. Paradoxically, Orwell then introduces a form of love that is “turned away from what is right, good and proper: wicked”1 in Winston’s and Julia’s ultimate submission to Big Brother and the State. These two events reveal that Orwell understands human behavior as well as he does totalitarian regimes and that, consequently, his love story is intentionally both traditional and perverse. We’re In This Together Subject to constant monitoring, Thought Police and spies observing one’s every move and overhearing one’s utterances, the possibility of a traditional love affair in Oceania seems unlikely or – more accurately - impossible. The image of couples strolling arm in arm through what was once Hyde Park cannot be imagined, and it is certainly not imagined by Winston Smith and Julia. But they try in their way and succeed – for a time. Orwell’s introduction of Julia is anything but traditional: “Winston had disliked her from the very first moment of seeing her.” (p12) In fact, Orwell goes on to reveal that his protagonist “disliked nearly all women, and especially the young and pretty ones.” It is an oddly blunt statement which becomes intriguing, especially when the girl appears to Winston in a dream with sensual connotations.(29) The puzzle becomes more complex, even suspicious, when she passes Winston outside the junk shop: “She looked him straight in the face . . .” (85) Orwell’s intentions become apparent - we think we understand - at their meeting in the Ministry when the girl passes a slip of paper into Winston’s hand. We suspect, like Winston, that she may be “an agent of the Thought Police . . .” (90) But in a masterful stroke of storytelling, Orwell stands Winston’s assumptions – and ours – on their head, because the message Julia passed to him reads, “I love you.” Events that had evolved with sinister implications lead, almost amusingly, to a traditional resolution: a love note. Winston’s reaction is significant because in it we perceive traditional human behavior; he wants to cease being a depressed rat in a maze and have contact with others. As Orwell writes, “At the sight of the words I love you the desire to stay alive had welled up in him . . .” (91) Aware that earlier he had “contemplated smashing her skull in,” (91) Winston is now rejuvenated by the prospect of her youth and beauty, her sexuality – and his. This initial response suggests lust rather than a mature relationship. But the deepening relationship between Julia and Winston as they struggle to establish their humanity/individuality pushes against the totalitarian society in which they must live and becomes, in a sense, traditional. Julia’s motivations for and expectations of the relationship are not Winston’s but her initial feelings mature from mere sexual interest: “With Julia, everything came back to her own sexuality.” (110) Such an observation suggests Julia is less complicated than Winston and that she has pursued this affair as a means of defying authority. Her commitment to the Party is similarly shallow, for “she only questioned the teachings of the Party when they . . . touched upon her own life.”(127) But, as Winston points out, she is too young to know what English society was like, too young to have even known England, for that matter. She does not have the memories Winston does but knows only the Party, which explains why she is more dismissive of the burdens placed on her by it. Moreover, her ignorance of pre-Oceania denies her any knowledge of what a traditional, marriage-oriented relationship is like; her affairs have been escapades to her. In the course of the story she changes, however - one might even say ‘matures;’ when Winston suggests the best thing to do would be walk away and never see one another again, as Julia admits having done in earlier affairs, she replies, “I’m not going to do it . . .”(137) Winston’s motives and expectations, on the other hand, are more complex, for he has memories of a time before the Party existed, and has been married. From that unhappy marriage he developed subtle traces of misogyny. He seems to be attracted to the’feminine’ but not the ‘female.’2 This is evident in his initial reaction to “the dark haired girl” (see above) as well as in his thoughts about his former wife, Katharine, who would accept his embraces by “neither resisting nor co-operating, but submitting.”(58) This suggestion of misogyny becomes almost demonic – and explicit - when he writes in his journal about sex with the toothless woman. Consequently, it is not initially apparent why he agrees to assignations with Julia or sees her as anything other than a means of satisfying lust - preferable to the toothless hag, to be sure. More significant, though, is Winston’s need to be able to talk openly and honestly with another human being, to behave like a human being. Always a writer capable of seeing nuance in human behavior, Orwell plays a sort of ‘dirty trick’ with Winston and Julia: he allows them to fall in love in a way they had not anticipated, to submit themselves to each other. Winston stops relying on his gin, and realizes “the process of life had ceased to be intolerable.” (124) “The room [above the junk shop] was . . . a pocket of the past where extinct animals could walk.” (124) By employing the adjective ‘extinct,’ Orwell suggests that their relationship is unique in Oceania, even quaint. If they cannot walk arm in arm through Hyde Park, they can do so in their rented nest. Though aware their relationship will not go undetected – and punished – for much longer, Julia and Winston become, through submission to one another, human beings, and believe, in a heart-rending passage, that “They [the Party] could lay bare . . . everything that you had done or said or thought; but the inner heart . . . remained impregnable.”(138) It is in their discussion of the anti-Party Brotherhood with O’Brien at his home that their love, their submission to one another, becomes explicit. When O’Brien asks if they would commit suicide for the Brotherhood they reply, “Yes.” Their commitment to the cause is sincere and mutual. But when he asks if they are prepared to never see one another again Julia breaks in with “No!” Winston agrees.(143) In that moment of decision, Julia and Winston are – in essence – making a vow of marriage, and Orwell has brought their love into a realm we can call traditional: the submission and commitment of two people to each other. And Now for Something Completely Different In the love Winston admits for O’Brien and Big Brother during as well as following his ‘reorientation,’ Orwell once again stands assumptions on their head by describing love that is perverse in the above-mentioned sense that it is “turned away from what is right.” It is not surprising that he does so; the world of Oceania, however logical in its self-justification, is itself perverse. That accepted, the perverse love that Orwell introduces is insidious – “wicked” - and explodes Julia’s and Winston’s more optimistic notion that “the inner heart . . . remained impregnable.”(see above) While in prison, Winston admits of Julia that “He loved her and would not betray her,” (189) but realizes this conviction is merely a fact. “He felt no love for her and hardly even wondered what was happening to her.” (Ibid) But the blow that is crushing in its perversity is delivered later when Winston realizes of his chief tormenter, O’Brien, that “He had never loved him so deeply as at this moment, and not merely because he [O’Brien] had stopped the pain.”(208) Why does he love him? Because, like Julia, “O’Brien was a person who could be talked to.”(Ibid). Winston’s ultimate accomplishment of a relationship with Julia is thus mirrored in his relationship with his torturer: he has found someone he can talk to, someone who allows him to be a human being while simultaneously denying him any individuality or validity as a human being. This paradox is perverse in that it turns Winston (and the reader, for that matter) “away from what is right, good or proper.” It also suggests another definition of perverse: contrary. It would seem inconceivable that a person could feel love for one who denied them their humanity. Of course, it is at the end of the novel in Winston’s realization that “He loved Big Brother” (245) that Orwell exposes the greatest perversity: Winston loves not just a thing but a thing that does not exist. In this moment we cannot escape the harshness of Orwell’s creation, his almost diabolical examination of submission in the juxtaposition of traditional love and perverse love. Works Cited All quotations are from the Signet Classic paperback edition of 1984. New York: 1977. 1. Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary of the American Language. Random House, New York: 1989. 2. I came upon this distinction between ‘feminine’ and ‘female’ in a fascinating book by Christopher Hitchens:Why Orwell Matters. Basic Books, New York: 2002. (154) PERSONAL NOTES (TO BE ERASED FOR FINAL SUBMISSION - obviously) 1. The heading of the last section (And now for something etc) refers to a running motif in Monty Python shows. At the end of a skit, occasionally a snotty Brit voice-over says: “And now for something completely different.” I mention this in case you’re not familiar with MP and your Prof. is. If you’re unfamiliar with MP, rent a DVD; they’re damned amusing – unless you despise Brit humor. 2. If you’re questioned about the Hitchens book, why not say you were doing coke with a grad student who happened to have the book on their coffee table next to the mirror from which you were snorting a few lines? 3. If this gets you a good grade, I would be grateful if you would consider contacting Ac-Res. and recommending a Reward point for me. It’s like a silly gold star from Kindergarten days but by amassing them I get to pick more $$$ assignments. 4. This version is shorter, I know, but it’s tighter. Also, the 1st person stuff is nixed and I think it stays on track more than the earlier version. Finally, I couldn’t manage your Prof’s ‘love-hate’ suggestion because it’s bullshit and trite; Orwell is far subtler Read More