I am just beginning my literature journey...

I am just beginning my literature journey. Of course I "read" what was required of me in high school but I merely extracted what I needed for my assignments, in other words, I read the books but made no attempt to understand them.

I (in a rather dark place) decided that I may as well pick try to read something because I had enjoyed reading when I was a child (obviously YA books such as HP and Percy Jackson) and picked 1984 out of a stack of mostly unopened or neglected books from my families bookshelf.

I was captivated. It unlocked deep emotions within me I had thought dormant. I related and empathized deeply with these characters and their circumstances. Then it was over.

I feel almost depressed? Not because of the ending itself or that it ended at all even, just very melancholy. Is this normal?

I am thinking about jumping into my next book (Siddhartha) but I feel like it may be too soon, that I haven't given myself enough time to process and understand what Orwell had just given me.

So I guess my question is, should I take some time before starting something else? Should I just move on and maybe understanding will come to me in time?

I'm not looking for some clear cut answer, I just wanted to know what you thought or about your personal experiences with this feeling.

(Also general 1984 discussion thread)

I think you can continue. Some works u just think about for the rest of ur life if they really ment something to you. If they did no new book will really take the message away and u have plenty of time to think about books u read afterr u read them.

>I am thinking about jumping into my next book (Siddhartha)
You sure you're not still in HS, because these were both assigned for me freshman year. Thankfully I'd read 1984 in eighth grade on my own and was able to understand it rather well. Hell, I was talking about it a few months back with one of my friends and she never figured out that Winston dies at the end.

9th: Lord of the Flies
10th: The Alchemist (among other options)
11th: A list of options I can't remember
12: Grapes of Wrath

I was even in AP.

Also I'm not particularly proud of this, but it isn't difficult to get an A on a paper about a book you didn't read. I was more preoccupied with Theatre and pussy at the time.

too*

sorry

They stopped offering AP English at my school to shill AICE classes, which had a pretty obvious left bias in all the reading we were given, specifically towards feminism.

>she never figured out that Winston dies at the end.
oh fuck, what?

I mean O'Brien says they're not going to kill him until he loves Big Brother, and the book ends saying he finally loves Big Brother. So either he dies soon after the end or he just straight up gets shot right there (with how The Party works, this would honestly be believable, imo)

I mean I guess you could look at it as his former self has died completely now that he loves BB, but I think he actually does die, it's just left a bit vague on purpose, which gives a better impact if you put it together.

I'm pretty sure his death is supposed to be ambiguous.

It's open to interpretation, and Veeky Forums will always choose the "WHATATWIST" interpretation when something's ambigious.

Probably is, but I really do think it leans heavily towards him dying.

Except it's not really a twist, O'Brien straight up tells him that they're gonna kill him after he learns to love BB.

I'll be honest I haven't read 1984 in a few years, but even my first time reading it I got the impression that he dies at the end.

O'Brien didn't tell him anything definitive about his fate during the torture, but the point is that it doesn't matter in the end.

Whether they do a second arrest and execute him in the future, or let him live out the rest of his natural lifespan. Winston is already dead inside and fully submitted to the party.

Didn't he say something along the lines of "we won;t kill you until after you love BB?"

I mean obviously he's dead inside, especially after that point, but I seriously see it as possible he's killed at the end. Maybe not even the party, maybe he ends up killing himself, who knows. I agree it is left ambiguous, and more or less open to interpretation, but in any way you look at it, he's dead in one way, either literally or figuratively.

One of the final paragraphs:

>The voice from the telescreen was still pouring forth its tale of prisoners and booty and slaughter, but the shouting outside had died down a little. The waiters were turning back to their work. One of them approached with the gin bottle. Winston, sitting in a blissful dream, paid no attention as his glass was filled up. He was not running or cheering any longer. He was back in the Ministry of Love, with everything forgiven, his soul white as snow. He was in the public dock, confessing everything, implicating everybody. He was walking down the white-tiled corridor, with the feeling of walking in sunlight, and an armed guard at his back. The long-hoped-for bullet was entering his brain.

Damn you guys make me realize either how shitty I was placed or how shitty my school was. Freshman through junior year i lived in a rural town and I remember reading TKAM, Night, Huckleberry finn, and Of mice and men, and then senior year in vegas we read animal farm, fahrenheit 451, and hamlet.

Throughout all of it, I and a handful of other people were the only ones that enjoyed the stuff. I didn't read 1984 or Siddhartha or The Stranger on my own until freshman year of college

Yes, but he also says that they may choose to set him free after the torture.

O'Brien's statement about not killing Winston until after he loves Big Brother was more him explaining why they don't simply execute him and instead go to these lengths to torture. It's not O'Brien saying that Winston will definitely be executed after they're finished with the torture, it's O'Brien saying that execution isn't an option until they've fully broken his will to prevent Winston from becoming a martyr.

At least that's how I interpreted it.

it literally says in that very paragraph that that is Winston's dream. He's imagining his own possible execution.

isnt saying to someone "you're not gonna die until you love BB" just a way of saying that not even death is a way out from loving BB?

I mean I can see how that could be interpreted as being a metaphor and all, but I do believe he dies at the end.

TKAM, Night and OMaM were all freshman year for me, but I got sent from High Honors to Honors because of class size limits.
Animal Farm and F451 were 8th grade reading for me, though my 8th grade English teacher was notorious at my school for teaching all the high school level books and shit.

>it literally says in that very paragraph that that is Winston's dream
>sitting in a blissful dream
Do you not understand metaphor at all?

It could be seen as that, I suppose.

Well after they're done torturing him they do "let him go" at least from MiniLuv, but they don't actually "let him go" free from BB, the torture or his looming death.

But it's not a metaphor user, he's sitting in a cafe with his glass being filled up.

And of course he didn't mean "letting him go" from BB, but he definitely meant letting him off the hook for an execution. O'Brien refers to letting Winston live the rest of his natural lifespan.

Was 18 when I read 1984, made me depressed for months. I guess it's normal. In fact I have never fully recovered from it. I'm not sure if that's normal though. Sometimes I wonder if this distopia is slowly coming true.

The being in a dream is a metaphor.

Looking back on it, with him going to the dock confessing everything, kinda makes me think now he might have actually killed himself.

I didn't mean dream in the sense of him going to sleep or hallucinating it or something, I meant it was him fantasizing his own execution.

>Then it was over.
>I feel almost depressed?

Congratulations, this proves you have no real friends, none that were capable of honesty in any case, welcome to Veeky Forums.

>'He was walking down the white-tiled corridor, with
the feeling of walking in sunlight, and an armed guard at
his back'
>The long-hoped-for bullet was entering his brain

It's like Veeky Forums didn't even read the book

It's a fantasy user. Again, he was sitting in a cafe being poured gin by a waiter moments before. It was just a fantasy about his own execution.

>Sometimes I wonder if this distopia is slowly coming true.

It is. It's pretty clear and easy to see that we are living in a combination of 1984 and Brave New World.

>Also I'm not particularly proud of this, but it isn't difficult to get an A on a paper about a book you didn't read. I was more preoccupied with Theatre and pussy at the time.

I did this in college. Graduated cum laude with a BA in English from a respected uni by falling asleep to audio books and skimming sparknotes. I regret it, but I was preoccupied with film, my depression, and anime.

I am probably reading too much into this but some of the descriptions of Julia in their last meeting had me thinking, was Julia pregnant at the end?

>>"Her face was sallower"
It is not uncommon for a woman's skin to be affected by pregnancy.

>>"It was that her waist had grown thicker"
self-explanatory

>>"Her feet seemed to have grown broader, he noticed"
also self-explanatory

I know that she had been changed in the Ministry of Love like Winston had, but those descriptions caught my eye.

>10th: The Alchemist
what

...

Granted, although there is no strong evidence to back that idea so it's a bit of a stretch to say it's because of the gin/brainwash/ego death etc.
Orwell inserted a scene mid book about a couple of anti-party individuals all of whom in fact, were caught, tortured, 'released' and attended the Chesnut Tree before being vaporized. The parallel seemed to me to be hinting more strongly to the actual fact being consummated in the end rather than of it being a pseudo-fantasy of Winston.