1984

Part One, Chapter 5

George Orwell · Mountaineers 10th–12th

Teaching Companion Print Adapt for your student

Copywork

There was something subtly wrong with Syme. There was something that he lacked: discretion, aloofness, a sort of saving stupidity. You could not say that he was unorthodox. He believed in the principles of Ingsoc, he venerated Big Brother, he rejoiced over victories, he hated heretics, not merely with sincerity but with a sort of restless zeal, an up-to-dateness of information, which the ordinary Party member did not approach.

And though, of course, it grew worse as one’s body aged, was it not a sign that this was not the natural order of things, if one’s heart sickened at the discomfort and dirt and scarcity, the interminable winters, the stickiness of one’s socks, the lifts that never worked, the cold water, the gritty soap, the cigarettes that came to pieces, the food with its strange evil tastes? Why should one feel it to be intolerable unless one had some kind of ancestral memory that things had once been different?

In the first passage, Winston finds something “subtly wrong” with a man who believes everything the Party teaches. In the second, his own body tells him something is wrong with the world. Which would the Party find harder to get rid of: the fault in Syme, or the feeling in Winston?

For the educator Two passages, six sentences. The first is Winston’s verdict on Syme. It opens with the same three words twice, “There was something”, and the second time a colon opens a list of three: “discretion, aloofness, a sort of saving stupidity”. The list climbs from two plain virtues to a phrase that should not make sense, since stupidity is not supposed to save anyone. Then a short sentence clears Syme of the obvious charge with a double negative: “You could not say that he was unorthodox.” The long sentence after it piles up four clauses that each begin with “he”, and then turns on “not merely … but”, so that Syme’s fault turns out to be too much of the right thing. The second passage is Winston on the canteen. The first sentence is a question that holds its point back. It grants an objection first (“though, of course, it grew worse as one’s body aged”), then asks its question, and only after “if” lets loose a long run of small miseries, from winters to socks to soap, ending on “the food with its strange evil tastes”. The second sentence is shorter and asks the question underneath the first one. Students copying them practise repetition at the start of sentences, a colon that opens a list, a list that ends on a paradox, a run of parallel clauses, “not merely … but”, a concession set inside a question, and a long catalogue held together by commas. For the talk prompt, listen for two readings. One says Syme’s fault is harder to remove: nothing in it can be charged, since “You could not say that he was unorthodox”, and it lives in the way he thinks, so only his removal would end it. The other says Winston’s feeling is harder: it sits “in your stomach and in your skin”, below words, where a shrinking language cannot reach it. A strong student may push back on the second reading: Winston himself admits he has “no memories of anything greatly different”, so his feeling stands on very little, and that may make it the easier of the two to wear away.

Discussion

Narration Give a short account of the lunch hour, from the razor blades to the whistle. Then pick the one sentence you think matters most, and say what it shows about the chapter as a whole.

Syme can tell that Winston is “still thinking in Oldspeak.” Yet Winston is sure that if Syme grasped his secret opinions, “even for three seconds,” he would betray him. Why might a man who sees that much not see the rest? Character
Syme wants to cut the word “bad”. He says “Ungood” will do as well, and better, “because it’s an exact opposite, which the other is not.” What, if anything, is lost when “bad” goes? Theme
Syme says the Newspeak word “duckspeak” is an insult for an opponent and praise for someone you agree with. The man at the next table is still quacking. Which way does Syme mean it? Tone
Parsons’s seven-year-old daughter followed a stranger for two hours because of “a funny kind of shoes.” Parsons calls it “Pretty smart”. What kind of smart is it? Moral reasoning
The day before, a cut in the chocolate ration to twenty grammes was announced. Now the telescreen reports crowds thanking Big Brother for “raising” it to twenty. Winston decides that Parsons, the quacking man and Syme all swallow it. How much of that can he really see? Inference
Winston thinks it “quite likely” that he will be in the cellars of the Ministry of Love within three days, “but a cigarette end must not be wasted.” Why is the cigarette end a rule, and the cellars only a guess? Character

Make a Connection Think of a time, in a story, in history or in your own life, when something became hard to say because the words for it were taken away. How did people manage, if they did?

Vocabulary

orthodoxy: Orthodoxy means not thinking – not needing to think. Right belief: holding exactly the views an authority approves (Greek orthos, straight or right, and doxa, opinion; an orthodontist straightens teeth). Syme turns the word inside out: “Orthodoxy means not thinking – not needing to think.” Winston later turns Syme’s next line, “Orthodoxy is unconsciousness”, into his own verdict on Syme. Here the right opinion is one you never have to think about at all.
furtively: You could only get hold of them, if at all, by scrounging more or less furtively on the ‘free’ market. Secretly and nervously, like someone who does not want to be seen (Latin furtivus, stolen, from fur, a thief). Razor blades can be had only “more or less furtively on the ‘free’ market”. The quote marks round ‘free’ are Orwell’s: a market you have to sneak into is not free. Winston hoards two blades and lies about them to Syme and to Parsons.
vapid: A sort of vapid eagerness flitted across Winston’s face at the mention of Big Brother. Flat and empty, with no real life or feeling in it (Latin vapidus, said of wine that has gone flat). Winston’s face shows “vapid eagerness” when Big Brother is mentioned: eagerness put on, with nothing behind it. Syme sees through it at once. The word names the mask the Party asks of every face, and how thin it can wear.
abstractedly: ‘Good,’ said Syme abstractedly, without looking up from his strip of paper. With the mind somewhere else, only half paying attention (from abstract, Latin abstrahere, to draw away). When Parsons tells how his daughter handed a stranger to the patrols, Syme says “Good” abstractedly, without looking up from his column of words. A stranger handed to the patrols gets one word from half a mind. The sharpest mind at the table is busy with words, not with the man.
edified: Parsons, his attention caught by the trumpet call, sat listening with a sort of gaping solemnity, a sort of edified boredom. Improved or instructed, usually in a moral or religious way (Latin aedificare, to build, as in edifice). Parsons listens to the figures with “a sort of edified boredom”: he cannot follow a single number, yet he feels uplifted by them. The phrase joins two feelings that should not go together, and that is how the Party’s news works on him.
aloofness: There was something that he lacked: discretion, aloofness, a sort of saving stupidity. The habit of keeping yourself apart, cool and at a distance (from aloof, once a sailing word for keeping a ship’s head to the wind, clear of the shore). Winston names it among the things Syme lacks. Syme leans across the table, talks too much and searches your face. A safe Party member holds back. Syme cannot hold anything back.
venerated: He believed in the principles of Ingsoc, he venerated Big Brother, he rejoiced over victories, he hated heretics, not merely with sincerity but with a sort of restless zeal, an up-to-dateness of information, which the ordinary Party member did not approach. Honoured with deep, almost religious respect (Latin venerari, to worship). Winston grants that Syme “venerated Big Brother”. Yet Syme’s warmth goes to Newspeak. He calls it beautiful, and mentions Big Brother only “as an afterthought”. The word tells us what Syme owes the Leader; his talk tells us what he loves.
interminable: And though, of course, it grew worse as one’s body aged, was it not a sign that this was not the natural order of things, if one’s heart sickened at the discomfort and dirt and scarcity, the interminable winters, the stickiness of one’s socks, the lifts that never worked, the cold water, the gritty soap, the cigarettes that came to pieces, the food with its strange evil tastes? Going on so long it seems it will never end (Latin in-, not, and terminare, to end, as in terminal and terminate). In Winston’s list of miseries, “the interminable winters” stand among socks, lifts and soap. To call the winters endless is already a complaint: it means they ought to end. The word carries the sentence’s question, whether this is “the natural order of things”.

Critical thinking

Winston sorts people into those who will be vaporized and those who never will. He admits that what makes a survivor “was not easy to say.” What rule could fit every name on both lists?
Winston thinks Syme lacks “a sort of saving stupidity.” Is Syme’s sharp mind his weakness, or the best thing about him?