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Copywork
About This Passage
As Winston leaves the junk shop, a half-remembered nursery rhyme about old London churches keeps running through his head. Notice how Orwell turns a simple rhyme into something haunting: the bells belong to 'a lost London that still existed somewhere or other, disguised and forgotten,' as if the whole vanished past were hidden just out of reach. The phrase 'one ghostly steeple after another' makes the lost city feel like a ghost Winston can almost hear but never see. The last sentence quietly reminds us that Winston has never actually heard church bells, so even this longing is for a world he never knew. Copying the passage lets a reader feel how powerfully a person can ache for a past that has been erased.
It was curious, but when you said it to yourself you had the illusion of actually hearing bells, the bells of a lost London that still existed somewhere or other, disguised and forgotten. From one gho...
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Discussion Questions
Narration Prompt
In your own words, tell the story of this chapter: how Winston wanders away from his evening meeting into the crowded prole streets, how he tries and fails to learn the truth about the past from an old man in a pub, how he buys a beautiful glass paperweight and finds a quiet room in the junk shop, and how he then sees the dark-haired girl following him and fears she is spying on him.
Discussion Questions
- Winston believes 'if there is hope, it lies in the proles,' yet when he looks at the real people in the street, the idea becomes 'an act of faith.' Why might Winston's hope in the proles feel reasonable when he writes it in his diary but almost impossible when he sees the real proles? Use the chapter's details about the proles to explain.
- Winston takes a real risk to buy a useless old glass paperweight and even dreams of renting the room above the shop. What do these choices reveal about what Winston most longs for, and why would he risk so much for things he does not need? Use the chapter's details about the shop to explain.
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Vocabulary
Item 1
The state of being alone, away from other people.
Item 2
A confusing maze of twisting paths.
Item 3
Something so unreasonable that it seems ridiculous.
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Critical Thinking
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