List of Characters

Winston Smith

Aged 39, he is an ordinary member of the Outer Party who works in the Records Department of the Ministry of Truth. He is not particularly intelligent, but has an inner courage, which gives him strength to rebel against the society of Oceania. 

Julia

Julia engages in a sexual relationship with Smith, not as an act of rebellion, but more through loneliness. She obtains companionship and sexual gratification from Winston who also provides a means of escape from the unsexed society in which they live.

O’Brien

He is everything to Winston.   He starts by being an apparent friend, almost a father figure, and then in his role as torturer he is also Winston’s schoolmaster and confessor. He is a high ranking Inner Party member and a direct representative of Big Brother in the Ministry of Love.

Mr. Carrington

He is a member of the Thought Police who poses as a member of the proletariat, those out with the Party, and he ensnares Winston and Julia.

Newspeak

This story deals with the authoritarian state of Oceania, whose official language is Newspeak, and the story lapses into this language and explanations will be given as and when necessary, e.g. the ideology of Oceania is Ingsoc, which is the Newspeak word for English Socialism. It is hoped that by the year 2050, Oldspeak or Standard English will be replaced by Newspeak. All literary work, written work and language will be in the new form. The purpose of Newspeak was not only to provide a medium of expression for the worldview, and mental habits proper to the followers of Ingsoc; but also to make all other modes of thought impossible.  It is intended that when Newspeak is adopted and Oldspeak forgotten, a heretical thought, that is one deviating from the principles of Ingsoc, will be literally unthinkable, at least so far as thought is dependant on words.  An example of this would be the word ‘free’.  Although this will still exist in Newspeak, it could only be used in such statements as ‘this child is free from head lice’ or ‘this garden is free from weeds’.   It could not be used in Oldspeak terms as intellectually free or politically free, as the concepts of such freedom no longer exist, and are therefore, nameless.