Part One, Chapter 2 — Teaching Companion

This chapter's big question

Winston writes that thoughtcrime is death and calls himself a dead man, yet right afterwards he takes more care to stay alive. Does accepting that he is doomed make him weaker or stronger?

The tension Facing the Ministry, he feels that “not even an anonymous word scribbled on a piece of paper” could survive; minutes later the clock strikes fourteen, it puts “new heart into him”, and he writes his greeting “To the future or to the past”, because “It was not by making yourself heard but by staying sane that you carried on the human heritage.”

Today's focus

The knock brings a neighbour, not the police, but her flat shows Winston what the Party does inside a family, and back at his table he finds a reason to keep the diary going.

The shape at a glance

As Winston goes to the door, he sees he has left his diary open on the table with DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER written all over it; he had not wanted to smudge the wet ink. The knock is only Mrs Parsons, a worn, nervous neighbour whose husband Tom works with Winston at the Ministry of Truth, asking him to unblock her kitchen sink. Her flat is battered and smells of sweat, and its walls carry banners of the Youth League and the Spies, the Party’s organisation for the young. Tom Parsons, Winston reflects, is a stupid, devoted enthusiast of exactly the kind the Party depends on. Winston clears a clot of hair from the pipe. Her son of nine and his younger sister, dressed in the uniform of the Spies, jump out and play at arresting him as a traitor and thought-criminal, with a ferocity that does not feel like a game; they are sulking because they could not go to see a public hanging of Eurasian prisoners. As Winston leaves, the boy hits him in the neck with a catapult, and what strikes Winston most is the mother’s frightened face. Back in his flat he reflects that the young are now trained to adore the Party, and that their elders live in fear of being denounced by them. He thinks of O’Brien, whose voice he believes spoke to him in a dream seven years ago: “We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness.” He does not know what it means, or whether O’Brien is a friend or an enemy. The telescreen announces a great victory in South India, and then that the chocolate ration will be cut. At the window Winston feels alone and fears the Party will last for ever; the Party’s slogans and Big Brother’s face are even on his coins, and nothing is his own but the inside of his skull. Facing the huge Ministry of Truth, he believes nothing he writes can survive. Then the clock strikes fourteen and, oddly, gives him heart: staying sane, not being heard, is what carries on the human heritage. He writes a greeting to the future or the past, from the age of uniformity and solitude. Deciding he is already a dead man, he writes that thoughtcrime is death, and then takes new care to stay alive: he scrubs the ink from his fingers and puts a grain of dust on the diary’s cover, so that he will know if anyone moves it.

A way in

Before reading, ask the student whether a truth is worth saying if no one will ever hear it. Then read the chapter in three stretches: from the door-knob to the catapult; from Winston’s return to the newsflash and the ration; and from the window to the grain of dust. In the first stretch, mark each place where the game turns real. In the third, mark where Winston’s mood turns, and what turns it. Read the paragraph about the Ministry (“His heart quailed”) and the paragraph after the clock aloud, one after the other. The chapter does not say what the dream’s words mean or whose side O’Brien is on, so leave both open.

Lesson plan

Retell The student retells the chapter in three movements: the visit to the Parsons flat, the thoughts at the table (the Spies, O’Brien, the newsflash), and the turn at the window and the diary. Look for the order of Winston’s moods, from relief to unease to despair to a steadier resolve, and for what sets each one off.

Imitate the author After copying, the student writes two short passages of their own. The first is a short, flat sentence that states something shocking as if it were ordinary, then a long one that opens “And with good reason”, sets an aside between dashes, and ends on its heaviest words. The second opens with a list that has no verb, then a long comparison that turns back on the speaker, then a sentence of three words, as the window passage does.

Debate Take sides on the last written question. One side argues that accepting his doom makes Winston stronger, and gathers the “new heart” after the clock, the greeting, and the scrubbed fingers and the grain of dust. The other argues that it makes him weaker, or only calmer, and gathers “not death but annihilation”, the “lonely ghost” no one will hear, and the hiding that is “quite useless”. Each side must answer the other’s best line. Neither may say the diary has been found, or whose side O’Brien is on.

Purpose Close on the chapter’s order. Ask why Orwell puts the Parsons flat first, so that Winston sees the Party at work inside a family before he looks out at the Ministry and despairs. Then ask why the chapter ends not on the greeting but on a grain of dust: the reader leaves Winston with a test he has set and not yet checked, and with the line “where he himself was the monster” still unanswered.

Three levels

Easier Read aloud the opening paragraph, the game from “Up with your hands!” to the catapult, the newsflash, the coin, and the paragraphs from “The telescreen struck fourteen” to the end. Make two lists: what frightens Winston in the chapter, and what steadies him. Talk through the first, second and fifth discussion questions, then answer the last written question aloud before writing it.

On level Talk through all five discussion questions in order, then write both written questions as a thesis, the strongest objection and a revised thesis, each with lines from the chapter.

Harder Ask for one argued essay on Tom Parsons, who never appears in the chapter. The narrator says the Party depends on such men “more even than on the Thought Police”, his smell “even remained behind him after he had gone”, and his son and daughter fill the flat with his enthusiasms. Why might Orwell keep Parsons offstage in a chapter so full of him? The essay should meet the objection that Parsons is only a comic figure.

Discussion

1. Winston left the diary open, with DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER across it, because he did not want to smudge the wet ink. He calls that “an inconceivably stupid thing to have done.” Is “stupid” the right word for it?Character

What it asks It asks the student to judge the first thing Winston sees as he goes to the door. DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER is written “in letters almost big enough to be legible across the room”, and the book lies open on the table. “It was an inconceivably stupid thing to have done. But, he realised, even in his panic he had not wanted to smudge the creamy paper by shutting the book while the ink was wet.” The student decides whether Winston’s own verdict is the right one, or whether another word fits better. At the end of the chapter the same man scrubs ink from his fingers and sets a grain of dust on the cover, so the chapter opens and closes on two kinds of care. The card must not say that anyone has seen the diary or will find it.

A strong answer A strong response takes a position on the word and argues from the two sentences. One reader agrees with Winston: a man whose life depends on a secret left it open, in letters almost legible across the room, to save a smudge. Another finds “stupid” too small: even in panic he put the page first, though he knows the diary will be “reduced to ashes”, which shows a care deeper than fear. The best answers notice that the care was not chosen, since he only “realised” it at the door, and set it beside the very different care he takes at the end of the chapter.

2. As her son pockets the catapult, Mrs Parsons drags him back into the doorway. Who is she protecting, and from whom?Character

What it asks It asks the student to read one quick act. The boy has played at arresting Winston, a game that is “not altogether a game”, and as Winston walks away something hits his neck “an agonisingly painful blow”. “He spun round just in time to see Mrs Parsons dragging her son back into the doorway while the boy pocketed a catapult.” Then the door closes, and “what most struck Winston was the look of helpless fright on the woman’s greyish face.” The student decides whom she is shielding, and from what, and points to the page. A grown Party member and a boy of nine in the uniform of the Spies: the student should ask which of the two holds more power in this world. The card must not say that the boy or his sister will report anyone at home: Winston fears it for her, but nothing of the kind happens in this chapter.

A strong answer A strong response names whom she protects and from what, and reads it from her act and her face. One reader says she protects Winston from her son: the boy has just hurt a grown man and wants to “hit or kick” him, and her fright is at a son she cannot hold. Another says she protects her son and her house from Winston: her boy has attacked a Party member with Tom away, and during the game her eyes went back and forth between both sides. The best answers ask who holds the power between a grown man and a boy in the Spies, notice how much of her fear shows before the catapult, and keep Winston’s guess about the years ahead apart from what the chapter shows.

3. The telescreen announces “a glorious victory”, and Winston thinks, “Bad news coming.” He is right: the chocolate ration is cut. If he can see through it so easily, who is the victory news for?Inference

What it asks It asks what the newsflash is for, when at least one listener sees straight through it. A trumpet call, then: “Our forces in South India have won a glorious victory.” The war, the voice says, may now be “within measurable distance of its end”. Winston thinks “Bad news coming.” “And sure enough, following on a gory description of the annihilation of a Eurasian army, with stupendous figures of killed and prisoners, came the announcement that, as from next week, the chocolate ration would be reduced from thirty grammes to twenty.” The anthem follows, “perhaps to celebrate the victory, perhaps to drown the memory of the lost chocolate”. The student decides whom the announcement is meant to work on, and how. Keep the talk on this broadcast and this listener, not on propaganda in general.

A strong answer A strong response names an audience and explains how the broadcast works on it. One reader says it is for the believers, men like Parsons and the young who treat the Party as “a sort of glorious game”, and that Winston’s seeing through it only leaves him lonelier. Another says it works on everyone, Winston too: the cut is read out openly, buried under “stupendous figures”, and followed by an anthem one must stand for, so it needs no belief to do its job. The best answers notice that Winston’s insight stays in his head, where it changes nothing outside him.

4. Winston cannot tell if O’Brien is a friend or an enemy, and it hardly seems to matter to him. Instead he feels “a link of understanding” between them. What does Winston think O’Brien understands?Character

What it asks It asks the student to name what Winston believes passes between him and O’Brien. Seven years ago he dreamed that a voice in a dark room said, “We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness.” It was “a statement, not a command”. He cannot remember when he first knew the voice as O’Brien’s, “But at any rate the identification existed.” Even “after this morning’s flash of the eyes” he cannot be sure whether O’Brien is a friend or an enemy. “Nor did it even seem to matter greatly. There was a link of understanding between them, more important than affection or partisanship.” The page never says what is understood, so the student must supply it and defend it from the paragraph. In a chapter where Winston gives up on being heard, O’Brien is the one man he still feels might understand him; the last question can draw on that, but this one should not ask it. The card must not say whether O’Brien is a friend or an enemy, and must not say what “the place where there is no darkness” is.

A strong answer A strong response names what Winston thinks O’Brien understands and argues from the paragraph. One reader says O’Brien understands what Winston understands, that the Party’s world is false, and that for a man this alone a shared mind matters more than a shared side. Another says O’Brien understands Winston himself and what will come of him: the words were “a statement, not a command” and “would come true”, and a friend or an enemy could know that equally well. The best answers notice that the link rests on a dream Winston cannot date and a glance he cannot read, and leave open both O’Brien’s side and the meaning of the dream’s words, as the chapter does.

5. Winston sends his greeting “From the age of uniformity, from the age of solitude”. How can people who are all made alike also be alone?Theme

What it asks It asks the student to hold together two words that look like opposites. The greeting is addressed “To the future or to the past, to a time when thought is free, when men are different from one another and do not live alone”, and it comes “From the age of uniformity, from the age of solitude, from the age of Big Brother, from the age of doublethink”. Each thing Winston wishes for answers something his own age lacks: being different answers uniformity, not living alone answers solitude. The student explains how sameness and loneliness can belong to one age, from what this chapter shows: the Parsons flat, the coin, the window. The card must not treat the greeting as simply hopeful: Winston writes it as “a lonely ghost uttering a truth that nobody would ever hear.”

A strong answer A strong response explains how one age can be both uniform and solitary, from this chapter. One reader says sameness leaves nothing to share: the little girl copying her brother, the mother with no one to finish a sentence to. Another says fear does both jobs at once: people make themselves alike because they might be overheard, and so no one can tell who is on his side. The best answers notice that the greeting pictures the future only by reversing the present, and weigh it as the words of “a lonely ghost”, not as a hopeful message.

Critical thinking

1. Winston decides the Spies turn the young into “ungovernable little savages” who still adore the Party. Their ferocity, he thinks, is “turned outwards”, against the State’s enemies. Minutes ago, a boy in the Spies hit him in the neck. How well does the boy fit Winston’s theory?

What it asks It asks the student to test Winston’s theory against the scene that gave rise to it. At his table he reasons that “by means of such organisations as the Spies they were systematically turned into ungovernable little savages, and yet this produced in them no tendency whatever to rebel against the discipline of the Party.” Instead, “All their ferocity was turned outwards, against the enemies of the State, against foreigners, traitors, saboteurs, thought-criminals.” Minutes before, a boy in the uniform of the Spies called Winston a traitor and a thought-criminal, showed “a quite evident desire to hit or kick Winston”, and hit him with a catapult as he left. The boy is sulking because he could not see the hanging, and his mother is frightened. The student builds a thesis on how well the boy fits the theory, meets the strongest objection, and revises. The card must not say that the boy or his sister will report their mother or anyone else: that is Winston’s fear, not an event.

A strong answer A strong response states a thesis on how well the boy fits, meets the strongest objection, and revises. One thesis says he fits exactly: every word he yells names an enemy of the State, and he longs to see Eurasian prisoners hanged, so his ferocity runs where the Party points it. The strongest objection is the catapult itself: it lands on a comrade from down the passage while the boy’s mother looks on in “helpless fright”, so “outwards” can reach anywhere the Party’s words can. A good revision might hold that the theory is right about the aim and wrong about the reach, or that the boy is frightening precisely because his game is obedient. Another might notice that the boy’s charge is true of Winston, and ask what that does to the word “game”.

2. Winston writes that thoughtcrime is death and calls himself a dead man, yet right afterwards he takes more care to stay alive. Does accepting that he is doomed make him weaker or stronger?

What it asks It asks the chapter’s whole question. Facing the Ministry of Truth, “too strong, it could not be stormed”, Winston sees “not death but annihilation” ahead: the diary in ashes, himself vapour, “not even an anonymous word scribbled on a piece of paper” left to survive. Then “The telescreen struck fourteen”, and “Curiously, the chiming of the hour seemed to have put new heart into him.” He is “a lonely ghost uttering a truth that nobody would ever hear”, yet “It was not by making yourself heard but by staying sane that you carried on the human heritage.” He writes his greeting. Then: “He was already dead, he reflected.” He writes, “Thoughtcrime does not entail death: thoughtcrime IS death.” And “Now that he had recognised himself as a dead man it became important to stay alive as long as possible.” He scrubs the ink from two fingers, puts the diary in the drawer, and sets a grain of dust on its cover. The student builds a thesis on whether accepting his doom weakens or strengthens him, meets the strongest objection, and revises. The card must not say that the diary has been found or will be, must not say whether O’Brien is a friend or an enemy, and must not read “He was already dead” as despair alone.

A strong answer A strong response states a thesis on whether accepting his doom weakens or strengthens Winston, answers the strongest objection, and revises. One thesis says stronger: after the clock he writes, reasons and acts with care, and a man who no longer bargains for safety can spend his time on staying sane. The strongest objection is that he has shrunk his aim to the inside of his skull, admits that hiding is “quite useless”, and wants only to last “as long as possible”, which looks like defeat made calm. A good revision might hold that he is weaker in the world and stronger in himself, or that the scrubbing and the grain of dust show a man who has stopped fearing death but not stopped wanting to live.

Vocabulary definitions