Book 1 Chapter 7

By: Lindsay Reicoff

Vocabulary• Criminality-The state, quality, or fact of being criminal-There was a vast amount of criminality in London, a whole world –within-

a-world of thieves, bandits, prostitutes, drug peddlers and racketeers of every description.

• Saccharine tablet-a sugar packet -Great areas of it even for a Party member, were neutral and nonpolitical, a

matter of slogging through dreary jobs, fighting for a place on the Tube, darning a warn-out sock, cadging a saccharine tablet, saving a cigarette end.

• Sinecures-A position or office that requires little or no work but provides a salary

-After confessing to these things they had been pardoned, reinstated in the party and given posts which were in fact sinecures but which sounded important.

• Untouchables-Being beyond the reach of criticism, impeachment, or attack

-But also they were outlaws, enemies, untouchables, doomed with absolute certainty to extinction within a year or two.

• Ruinous-dilapidated or decayed-But when Winston glanced again at Rutherford's face ruinous face he

saw that his eyes were full of tears.

• Frontispiece-An illustration that faces or immediately precedes the title page of a book, book section, or magazine

-He picked up the children's book and looked at the portrait of Big Brother which formed its frontispiece.

Newspeak Vocabulary

• Chestnut Tree Café - The "haunt of painters and musicians.” There was no law, against going to the the Chestnut Tree Café often, yet the place was somehow inauspicious.

• Jus primae noctics-the law by which every capitalist had the right to sleep any women working in one of his factories

Literary Elements• They needed to only rise up and shake themselves like a horse shaking off flies. -This is a simile, because it is comparing the proles shaking themselves off to horses

getting flies off of them. This contributed to the text by giving us a vision of how strong the proles are showing us there power of being able to blow up the party at any time.

• Chestnut Tree Café-The café symbolizes the old Soviet Union Coffee shop where the leaders of the

government would meet to discuss their dominance over their disliked employees. It can also symbolize an old nursery rhyme that Orwell probably got its name from that was prevalent in the days when he was growing up. Its words were "under the spreading chestnut tree, I kissed you and you kissed me" but in 1984 he changes those words to "under the spreading chestnut tree I sold you and you sold me.“ The café contributes to the text by giving us an idea of how the party members met and discussed things.

• Left to themselves, like cattle turned loose upon the plains of Argentina, they had reverted to a style of life that appeared to be neutral to them, a sort of ancestral pattern.

-This is a simile, because it is comparing the women fighting over the Cooking pots to Cattle turned loose upon the plains of Argentina. This contributed to the text by giving us a vision of how feisty the women were and how desperate they were to get a cooking pot, also how they were running and yelling at people to move so they could get a flimsy

pot.

• When he had reached the spot it was to see a mob of two or three hundred women crowding around the stalls of a street market with faces as tragic as though they had been the doomed

passengers on a sinking ship.-This is a simile, because he is comparing the women's faces to the face of

person who was on a sinking ship. This contributed to the text by showing how revengeful the women can be, so Winston was wondering why they couldn’t be like that towards the government.

• But simultaneously, true to the principles of double think the Party taught that the proles are natural inferiors who must be kept in subjection, like animals, by the application of a few simple rules.

• -This is irony because the party has come to statute to serve the interests of the proletariat, it also shows the Party's attitude towards freedom. Freedom of thought is a basic and natural right of all human beings that the Party is denying its members. The concept of freedom in the new society is turned to its contradictory, where freedom is slavery.

Character analysis

• Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford- a few of the last survivors of the original leaders of the Revolution. Except for big brother they were all exposed as traitors and counter-revolutionaries, or vaporized. Like all Party enemies, they were arrested and then released for a while after they confessed, but eventually killed by the Thought Police. After their release Winston saw them in the Chestnut Tree Café. They were silent and motionless, and Aaronson and Rutherford had broken noses. When Winston looked over he saw that Rutherfords eyes were filled with tears.

Discussion Questions

1.Why does Winston think the proles are "unconscious?”• He thinks the proles are unconscious because they fight about

little things, instead of thinking of a plan and not using the strength they could build as coming together and fighting against the government. The proles are not aware of the strength they could actually have.

2.What doe Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford symbolize when winston sees them at the Chestnut Tree Café?

• They symbolize the torture you would go through if you were caught being a thought criminalist, and then later released. Also how you lose your sole and personality while you are in captivity.

3.What does Winston mean by the Quote “If there is hope it lies in the proles?”

• Winston means that the only chance of anyone getting rid of the party is for the proles to come together and rebel as one against the government.

4.Why does Orwell keep referring to “Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows?”

• He keep referring to it because Big Brother will tell you that it equals 5, but if you have that freedom where you can say it equals 4 confidentially can overcome Big Brother.

5.What would you have done with the picture Winston received through the tubes of Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford?

• I would have tried to keep it somewhere safe like in a lock box so I have that one piece of history that hasn’t yet been altered.

Summary• In the beginning Winston starts out writing in his diary about how he hopes that

someday the proles will rebel against Big Brother and destroy the government. The proles need to become conscious of how strong they would be if the all joined forces. He remembered back and was reminded of how the proles live Ignorant lives like animals, and are not motivated to revolt against the government. Winston pulled an old children's history text book out of his desk, so that he can get an Idea of what the world is supposed to look like. In the history book it shows how the cities are magnificent but Winston knows the truth because London is run down and messy. The book shows that the Party has increased the literacy rate, reduced the infant mortality rate and given everyone better food and shelter. Winston thinks that this is all false, but he can not be sure because the history was written by the party. Winston saw three revolution leaders who had been caught going against Big Brother. He saw them at the Chestnut Tree Café where a song began to play and “Under the chestnut tree,” and he noticed one of the men beginning to cry. One day he received a photograph of the three men in New York. The photograph was taken at the same time the men were supposedly committing treason. Therefore, Winston caught Big Brother in a lie. Winston was so frightened, that he destroyed the picture, but he will always remember it.

Analysis• Winston thinks, that if the proles would join forces, is the only

way that Big Brother can be defeated. The problem is that the proles don’t have anybody to lead them, and they are more concerned about unimportant things, rather than bettering there lives. Winston hopes that the proles wake up and realize what they could do if they all came together.

• The themes of memory, history, and fact go along with the photograph of the party members. The photograph is a symbol of the real history of what Winston believes to be true. Winston says that “two plus two equals four,” this is a symbol of right versus wrong. It is also a symbol of the freedom he hopes to have someday.