Nineteen Eighty-Four Final Writing Assignment (Due: Friday, February 27, 2009)

DUE: Friday, February 27, 2008, 7 a.m. (Note: Late posts will incur a 5-point per day decrease in score.)

TOTAL POINTS: 60

FORMAT: Responses should be between 1-2 pages in length when single-spaced in Times New Roman, 12 point font

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES: Papers should be posted to your blog. I recommend using a word processing program (like Word) to compose and save your writing.
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“You are here because you have failed in humility, in self-discipline. You would not make the act of submission which is the price of sanity. You preferred to be a lunatic, a minority of one. Only the disciplined mind can see reality, Winston. You believe that reality is something objective, external, existing in its own right. You also believe that the nature of reality is self-evident. When you delude yourself into thinking that you see something, you assume that everyone else sees the same things as you. But I tell you, Winston, that reality is not external. Reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else. Not in the individual mind, which can make mistakes, and in any case soon perishes; only in the mind of the Party, which is collective and immortal. What-ever the Party holds to be the truth is truth. It is impossible to see reality except by looking through the eyes of the Party. That is the fact that you have got to relearn, Winston. It needs an act of self-destruction, an effort of the will. You must humble yourself before you can become sane” (pp. 205-206).

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PROMPT:

Discuss the role that the doctrine O’Brien proclaims to Winston in this passage plays a) in maintaining the system of oligarchical collectivism upon which INGSOC is based and b) in Winston’s ultimate fate at the close of the novel.

You may draw upon any sections of the novel in support of your argument, but you must support your assertions with textual evidence. Do not summarize the plot of the novel in your response.