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marsisred's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Graphic: Abandonment, Alcoholism, Antisemitism, Blood, Body horror, Cursing, Death, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Mass/school shootings, Medical content, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Police brutality, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Self harm, Sexism, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, War, and Violence
accio_gays's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
Graphic: Blood, Death, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Torture, Violence, and Confinement
Moderate: Abandonment, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicide, War, Antisemitism, Body shaming, Colonisation, and Fatphobia
Minor: Alcohol, Alcoholism, Grief, Slavery, and Vomit
elodie_melodie's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Forced institutionalization, Medical content, Murder, Physical abuse, Police brutality, Rape, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Torture, Violence, and War
Minor: Alcohol, Alcoholism, Antisemitism, Misogyny, and Sexual content
simixfe's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.75
The concept was good but the implementation was lacking...
I probably would have enjoyed it if it hadn't been written by Orwell
I read it a second time for my A-level and surprisingly I liked it even less. As for now, I would only give it 2⭐ My criticism from the first time reading it still holds true for me but the second time it felt even more annoying and repetitive...
The plot could be summarised with only a few words
Winston: all women bad, government bad too
Julia: I love you
Sex
Talking about rebellion
More sex
Even more sex
Receives "the book" from O'Brien
Info dump
Arrest
Torture
Rats
Gives in
End
And a lot more passages with only info dump
Graphic: Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Suicidal thoughts, Body horror, Emotional abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Torture, Violence, Vomit, Antisemitism, Alcoholism, Physical abuse, and Police brutality
Moderate: War, Child death, and Death of parent
Minor: Suicide, Murder, and Slavery
ac_hamilton's review against another edition
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.75
Moderate: Sexism and Antisemitism
bradiehilliard's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
Graphic: Alcohol, Alcoholism, Antisemitism, Child death, Colonisation, Confinement, Death, Forced institutionalization, Kidnapping, Police brutality, Torture, Violence, War, and Xenophobia
tiredurbanist's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Graphic: Antisemitism, Blood, Body horror, Genocide, Gore, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Murder, Rape, Sexual content, Torture, and Violence
starofash's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.75
the main character, winston smith, is portrayed as extremely careful and untrusting for the first part of the book, but one encounter with a woman who (apparently) loves him is enough to make him throw all his concerns about how awfully loyal to the party and undeserving of trust all young women are over board and he then enters a relationship with her.
his actions seem to contradict the character as we got to know him in the first 100 pages of the book.
(he also had r@pe fantasies about his love interest, julia, in these first 100 pages of the book and she later says that she "hates women". there's a lot of misogony in this book!)
also, the whole book basically builds up to this high suspense point where winston gets in contact with a high-ranking party member who he is convinced is part of the rebellion, or at least dislikes the party and the big brother, but once it actually happens, the book is basically over. there's a whole lot of dense, mildly interesting political theory and directly after that, the thing winston knew would happen from the start actually happens,
i AM glad i read it, but i don't think my life would've been worse if i hadn't.
Graphic: Alcohol, Rape, and Torture
Moderate: Antisemitism, Gaslighting, Misogyny, Racism, War, and Xenophobia
Minor: Child death and Death of parent
bibs's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.0
I had pretty high hopes for this book, everyone that I talked to loves it, and when I started it after years of wanting to read it I was shocked at the misogyny expressed that no one had told me about. This fact put me off reading it and may have tainted the rest of the experience for me; this review is solely my experience with it given my background and expectations, if you like this book and don't mind the problems it may have in my eyes, that is totally valid!
I think the book (personally) doesn't hold as the masterpiece it is said to be; I find the messages to be all very in-your-face, nothing is left for the reader to think about and form their own opinion on. This doesn't really hold as a good criticism of Socialism, either, because it basically makes a strawman argument against it (I've heard that "Animal Farm" is better in that regard).
Before I list my problems with this book, I want to say that Winston is a pretty unlikable character.
Main Sins:
- The descriptions of fat people are all pretty bad and made me want to burn the book because they had no relevance to the plot;
- Winston just hates all women and thinks that they're all dumb, blind Party-followers or just weak, until he finds one that says "I love you" and then he suddenly stops hating women *sigh*. Also pretty big TW for rape bc this mas is honestly crazy;
- He has some hope that poor people can change the current situation but overall he isn't that nice to them in his narration (writing their lines with grammar errors was a pretty low blow in my opinion), for the most part, they just mindlessly accepting anything that is thrown at them;
- The representation of Communism/Socialism seems more like a Capitalist Society with some mentions of food and clothing stramps for Party-members
Also, George Orwell acts like older generations don't spend their days complaining about the current state of society, and saying that young people are all degenerates (I understand that under a totalitarian system people won't have the same freedom to express their ideas, but the proles seem to live with pretty little surveillance compared to Party workers/members and they still don't emit any opinions like "When I was young...")
Conclusion:
That said, I still think that this might be a worthy read if you're aware that this is a book with very outdated views regarding some issues and you feel like it can still be interesting, you should go for it. It wasn't mindblowing for me personally but this is a favorite for many of my friends.
Graphic: Torture, Body shaming, Xenophobia, Suicidal thoughts, Sexual violence, Sexual content, Sexism, Fatphobia, Forced institutionalization, Misogyny, and Police brutality
Moderate: Alcoholism, Antisemitism, Child death, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, Fatphobia, and Genocide
lalu's review against another edition
London, 1984: England is part of "Oceania", one of the three super states into which the world has been divided after the Revolution. Winston's job at the Ministry of Truth is the "correcting" of old newspaper articles on order to reflect the current political and societal sitiuation - because what the Party says is and has always been the truth. Also: Big Brother is watching you.
"Nineteen Eighty-Four" didn't fully convince me as a novel, but the idea behind it is disturbingly impressive and shows alarming parallels to today's North Korea...
dnf'd in 2021 - Warning: strong language!
He disliked nearly all women, and especially the young and pretty ones.
It was a lean Jewish face, with a great fuzzy aureole of white hair and a small goatee beard - a clever face, and yet somehow inherently despicable, with a kind of senile silliness in the long thin nose [...]. It resembled the face of a sheep, and the voice, too, had a sheeplike quality.
Vivid, beautiful hallucinations flashed through his mind. He would flog her to death with a rubber truncheon. He would tie her naked to a stake and shoot her full of arrows like Saint Sebastian. He would ravish her and cut her throat at the moment of climax [...]. He hated her because she was young and pretty and sexless, because he wanted to go to bed with her.
Graphic: Torture, Sexism, and Sexual content
Moderate: Rape and Racism
Minor: Antisemitism