The Great Depression and 1984

1
The Great Depression and 1984

• Student 1
• Advanced Grammar Composition
• November 2004

2
Where did the ideas in 1984 come from?

• Orwells world of 1984 seems outlandish to us
  today.
• How could he possibly have thought such a world
  could ever exist?
• The world that existed during and following the
  Great Depression is very similar to 1984

3
Fears of Great Depression in 1984.

• The themes portrayed in 1984 represent the
  greatest fears of the public during the Great
  Depression.
• People do not seem to see that 1984 is in
  reality 1948 (Knoll 96).

4
In the 1940s.

• Orwells predictions for 1984 were made in the
  40s.
• At this time America was still recovering from
  the Great Depression.

5
The Practicality of Orwells ideas

• When we look at what was occurring in the world
  during the Great Depression, it is easy to see
  how Orwell could have predicted the world to turn
  out in such a depressing way by the year 1984.
• In 1938 or 1939 the idea of a world divided
  among a few totalitarian superpowers, which
  Orwell made into the premise of his book, had not
  seemed at all farfetched (Howe 95).

6
How the Depression contributed to Orwells 1984

• From 1929 to the early 1950s our country
  experienced something it had never experienced
  before.
• Everything seemed to be going in a downward
  spiralsocially, emotionally, and physically-the
  world was not a good place to live.

7

Left Migrating family from Texas Above left
migrating mother and children Above Migrating
mother in makeshift home.
8
Was Orwell off base?

• At the time of the writing of 1984 Orwell had
  good reason to be concerned about an upsurge of
  totalitarian thinking (Gottlieb 8).
• The novel was not an hysterical diagnosis of a
  world in a normal state of health it was rather,
  an accurate diagnosis of the world in the throes
  of an hysterical disease (Gottlieb 8).

9
1984 vs. The Great Depression

• Socially
• Emotionally
• Physically

10
Oceanias Social Ladder

• Oceania is basically a communist government.
• It represents a society that Americans feared
  during the Depression.
• Those who are in powerful positions (inner party)
  have everything, and those who are high class
  (outer party) have very little, but those who are
  low class (proles) have nothing. The government
  distributes everything.

11
Oceanias Social Scope

• Big Brother posters were everywhere in 1984.
• On each landing, opposite the lift shaft, the
  poster with the enormous face gazed from the
  wall Big Brother is Watching You, the caption
  beneath it ran (1-3).

12
Americas Social Worries

• America was afraid of becoming a communistic or
  socialistic country.
• Russia was experiencing effects of Stalin.
• Hitler was beginning to gain ground in Germany.

13
Confession of a Chinese College Student (1949).

• Found in the Chinese Communist Liberation Daily
• Not quite two weeks after I had entered the
  Corps a squad leadertold the membersthat he had
  the right to examine on behalf of the
  organization all our letters and diaries.we went
  to headquarters to complainThere we were told
  Have you not joined the revolution? Is your
  intention not to serve the people? There can be
  nothing in your mind or possession which cannot
  be made fully public. In your letters and
  diaries are your true thoughts, and if you are
  true revolutionaries, you need not be afraid of
  these thoughts (Gleckner).

14
American Social Issues

• During the depression the presence of the
  federal government became a part of everyday life
  as never beforeBy Pearl Harbor time one could
  hardly buy a stamp or visit a federal office
  without encountering in lobby or stairway a
  well-meaning example of Federal Art (Watkins
  186-187).

15
Social Depression

• No depression before or after the Great
  Depression has been so severe and so long it
  is the single most important economic event in
  the twentieth century (Smiley X).
• The 1930s is the only decade in the history of
  the United Stated in which there was no economic
  growth (Smiley 4).

16
Worldwide Economics

• The depression was not confined to the United
  States it was worldwide.
• By 1930 the depression was affecting all the
  developed countries (Smiley 17).

17
Orwells predicted world

• The economy is not allowed to grow. The
  government makes sure that there is never
  plenty for everybody Oceania is always at war.
• As for the problem of overproductionit is
  solved by the device of continuous warfare (207).

18
Worldwide Economics in 1984

• Oceania, Eurasia, and Eastasia are all the same.
  They each have a very similar system and their
  economies are equal.
• So, the economic world of 1984 is very similar to
  the world of the depression.

19
Emotionally-Oceania

• Oceania is a world of anxiety. One has no
  friends, and cannot trust his/her own family..
• Nearly all children nowadays were horribleIt
  was normal for people over thirty to be
  frightened of their own children (24).

20
Winston secretly talking to Julia

21
The Emotional State during the Depression

• Said of the great depression by W.H. Auden It
  was an age of anxiety (Watkins 306).

Mother of five children, sick in bed. Aliquippa,
Pennsylvania.
The only home of a depression-routed family of
nine from Iowa.
22
Emotionally

• During the depression I lost something. Maybe
  you call it self-respect, but in losing it I
  also lost the respect of my children, and I am
  afraid that I am losing my wife (Kennedy 164).

23
Emotionally

• Its only natural when a father cannot support
  his family, supply them with clothing and good
  food, the children are bound to lose respect
  (Kennedy 166).

Once a prosperous Texas farmer, near Bakersfield,
California, now come to California looking for
work and work for his family in cotton. No work,
and no money.
24
Physically

• In some ways life in the Oceania of 1984 does
  not differ very much from the life we live now
  (1940s) The pannikin of pinkish gray stew, the
  hunk of bread and cube of cheesethat is the
  kind of meal we may very well remember (qtd. in
  Howe 96).

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Physically

• During the depression I was told there were
  children in West Virginia who have never tasted
  milkmost of the women you see in the camps are
  going without shoes or stockingsIts fairly
  common to see children entirely naked (qtd. in
  Kennedy).

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Physically-Oceania

• Winston and Syme pushed their trays beneath the
  grille. Onto each was dumped swiftly the
  regulation lunchmetal pannikin of pinkish gray
  stew, a hunk of bread, a cube of cheese, a mug of
  milkless Victory coffee, and one saccharine
  tablet (50).

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What can we conclude?

• Orwells idea is not farfetched. In fact it is
  very similar to the world that existed, and we
  are lucky that our society has grown and changed
  into something that is better than 1984.

28
Works Cited

• Gleckner, Robert F. 1984 or 1948? College
  English 18.2 (1956). Literature Resource Center.
  Icy Belle Library. 11 Nov 2004.
• Gottlieb, Erika. The Orwell Conundrum A Cry of
  Despair of Faith in the Spirit of Man? Canada
  Carleton University Press, 1992.
• Howe, Irving. 1984 Enigmas of Power. Ed.
  Howard Bloom. Modern Critical Interpretations
  George Orwells 1984. New York Chelsea House
  Publishers, 1987. 95-107.
• IMDB University. 1984 Movie (1956).
  http//www.orwell.ru/a_life/movies/m84_04.htm
• Kennedy, David M. Freedom From Fear The
  American People in Depression and War,
  1929-1945.
• Lange, Dorothea. Migrant Mother Photographs.
  The Library of Congress. http//lcweb2.loc.gov/am
  mem/fsachtml/fsowhome.html
• Lange, Dorothea. Depression routed family of
  nine. The Library of Congress.
  http//lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/fsachtml/fsowhome.html
  
• Lange, Dorothea. Texas farmer from Iowa. The
  Library of Congress. http//lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/
  fsachtml/fsowhome.html

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Works Cited

• Orwell, George. 1984. New York Signet
  Classic Printing, 1950.
• Smiley, Gene. Rethinking the Great Depression.
  Chicago Ivan R. Dee, 2002.
• Vachon, John. Mother of five children. The
  Library of Congress. http//lcweb2.loc.gov/am
  mem/fsachtml/fsowhome.html
• Watkins, T.H. The Great Depression. Boston
  Little, Brown Company, 1993.
• Wolcott, Marion Post. The Library of Congress.
  http//lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/fsachtml/fsowhome.htm
  l