SPA- 1984 -1

Today, we discovered that we are going to now be working on 'Nineteen Eighty-Four' a novel by George Orwell. We are going to be working on the play adaptation created by Robert Icke and Duncan MacMillan. The novel is set in Airstrip One (formerly known as Great Britain), a province of the super state Oceania in a world of perpetual war, omnipresent government surveillance and public manipulation, dictated by a political system euphemistically named English Socialism (or Ingsoc in the government's invented language, Newspeak) under the control of a privileged elite of the Inner Party, that persecutes individualism and independent thinking which is called "thought crime." The tyranny is epitomised by Big Brother, the Party leader who enjoys an intense cult of personality but who may not even exist. The Party "seeks power entirely for its own sake. It is not interested in the good of others; it is interested solely in power." Winston Smith, is a member of the Outer Party, who works for the Ministry of Truth, which is responsible for propaganda and historical revisionism. His job is to rewrite past newspaper articles, so that the historical record always supports the party line. The instructions that the workers receive specify the corrections as fixing misquotations and never as what they really are: forgeries and falsifications. A large part of the ministry also actively destroys all documents that have been edited and do not contain the revisions; in this way, no proof exists that the government is lying. Smith is a diligent and skilful worker but secretly hates the Party and dreams of rebellion against Big Brother. Orwell based the character of the heroine of the novel, Julia.




Main character descriptions;


Winston Smith - A minor member of the ruling Party in near-future London, Winston Smith is a thin, frail, contemplative, intellectual, and fatalistic thirty-nine-year-old. Winston hates the totalitarian control and enforced repression that are characteristic of his government. He harbours revolutionary dreams.             

                
Julia - Winston’s lover, a beautiful dark-haired girl working in the Fiction Department at the Ministry of Truth. Julia enjoys sex, and claims to have had affairs with many Party members. Julia is pragmatic and optimistic. Her rebellion against the Party is small and personal, for her own enjoyment, in contrast to Winston’s ideological motivation.                

                
O’Brien - A mysterious, powerful, and sophisticated member of the Inner Party whom Winston believes is also a member of the Brotherhood, the legendary group of anti-Party rebels.                

                
Mr. Charrington - An old man who runs a second-hand store in the prole district. Kindly and encouraging, Mr. Charrington seems to share Winston’s interest in the past. He also seems to support Winston’s rebellion against the Party and his relationship with Julia, since he rents Winston a room without a telescreen in which to carry out his affair. But Mr. Charrington is not as he seems. He is a member of the Thought Police.

                
Syme - An intelligent, outgoing man who works with Winston at the Ministry of Truth. Syme specializes in language. As the novel opens, he is working on a new edition of the Newspeak dictionary. Winston believes Syme is too intelligent to stay in the Party’s favour.

                
Parsons - A fat, obnoxious, and dull Party member who lives near Winston and works at the Ministry of Truth. He has a dull wife and a group of suspicious, ill-mannered children who are members of the Junior Spies.   

                
Emmanuel Goldstein - Another figure who exerts an influence on the novel without ever appearing in it. According to the Party, Goldstein is the legendary leader of the Brotherhood. He seems to have been a Party leader who fell out of favour with the regime. In any case, the Party describes him as the most dangerous and treacherous man in Oceania.

Big Brother -  Though he never appears in the novel, and though he may not actually exist, Big Brother, the perceived ruler of Oceania, is an extremely important figure. Everywhere Winston looks he sees posters of Big Brother’s face bearing the message “BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU.” Big Brother’s image is stamped on coins and broadcast on the unavoidable telescreens; it haunts Winston’s life and fills him with hatred and fascination.
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Within this first lesson we broke off into two groups (I worked with Katya, Oliver M, Rob and James) to create a prologue for our performance. We discussed and agreed that our aim for this prologue was to show the abduction of individuality and distinctiveness of the people. We started our piece with us walking in, in formation to then stop and move in unison with our movements becoming more precise and exact as we go on to show how we are progressing to have less control of ourselves and are cloning into the same comrades, like big brother wants. We focused on getting the timing of our movements very precise due to the perfection that is expected of people within this universe, whilst still having very jagged and rigged  robotic movements. We were a little rushed towards the end of devising this, but alas we showed the other group and then they did for us too we had very different movements but both had the underlying theme of peoples identities being reaped by Big Brother. As we want our opening to be compelling, we have decided that we are going to combine the two prologues together as if combined, dynamics from the two would suit.