Extended Essay

What methods of control are used by George Orwell and Ray Bradbury in their dystopian novels Nineteen Eighty-Four and

Fahrenheit 451?

Adil KhanIB Candidate Number: 000431 026

                                      May 2011                                                                                    Word Count: 3,806

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Abstract

The purpose of this extended essay is to explore what methods of control are used by

George Orwell and Ray Bradbury in their dystopian novels Nineteen Eighty-Four and

Fahrenheit 451. Research was conducted by analysing the two novels in search of the

differences and commonalities within them. Orthodoxy is used to set standards and laws

which citizens should follow unconsciously. Literature and history is censored heavily so as

to restrict knowledge of society’s flaws and influence of ideas volatile to the regime. The

media and technology is used, to either sedate or spy on its people, which is arguably the

method of control most prominent in today’s society. Society is disjointed, as even familial

relationships are only superficial yet in the spirit of comradeship society is a collective strife

towards societal functionality. Language has taken on new purposes as it is distorted to meet

the government’s needs and can be exploited as a tool for mind-control. Knowledge and

emotion have been eradicated for the most part because authorities have sensed, rightly so,

that they pose a risk of reversing the dehumanisation of society that they have developed. A

society devoid of wisdom and passion is easier to administer as its behaviour and desires

become more predictable, lending itself to wider exploitation. Although people are not

necessarily given basic rights, such as privacy, they are nonetheless unaware of the injustice

caused to them because they are wholly unaware of a different existence to their own. In

Fahrenheit 451, the populace was well managed and their cognitive and social behaviour

fitted with the government’s expectations. The main conclusion drawn from this essay is that

a substantial knowledge of the techniques used by the government will help to prevent any

controls and limitations on our own privacy, liberty, and freedom of speech.

Word Count: 299

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Contents

I. Abstract..........................................................................................................................1

II. Introduction....................................................................................................................3

III. “Orthodoxy is unconsciousness”....................................................................................4

IV. Censorship......................................................................................................................5

V. Enforcement...................................................................................................................7

VI. Love and fear…..............................................................................................................8

VII. Media..............................................................................................................................9

VIII. Collectivism.................................................................................................................10

IX. Language......................................................................................................................13

X. Knowledge...................................................................................................................14

XI. Emotion........................................................................................................................16

XII. Conclusion....................................................................................................................18

XII. Bibliography.................................................................................................................19

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II. Introduction

In George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four and Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 a

dystopian vision of the future is presented. As such, they both have in common an authority

ruling its people under a totalitarian thumb and who, in the pursuit of degenerating humanity,

has utilised several mediums, which our own society should be aware of. Nineteen Eighty-

Four expresses George Orwell’s political sentiments, cultivated by his experiences in the

Spanish Civil War, and his disillusionment of Communism due to the social fallacies within

it (Angus). Bradbury, in the midst of McCarthyism, felt the threat of censorship and

Socialism in the United States, and wrote his novel to highlight these themes. Both authors

have communicated their opinions in a dystopia, the opposite of what we would expect in a

utopia. Therefore, the reader sees the contrast and irony arising between the two situations

and thus the elements that constitute a dystopia become apparent. The identification of

dystopian elements inculcates an awareness of similar attributes in the reader’s own society,

thereby allowing the reader to be unsullied by institutionalisation and depravity. The

elements of a dystopia are engendered by the methods of control used by the administrators

of that society. The purpose of this paper will be to explore what methods of control are used

by George Orwell and Ray Bradbury in their dystopian novels Nineteen Eighty-Four and

Fahrenheit 451.

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III. “Orthodoxy is unconsciousness”

“Orthodoxy is unconsciousness” (Orwell, 61). The only way, according to O’Brien,

the man who tortures Winston Smith at the “Ministry of Love”, for society to work is for

obedience, trust and belief in Big Brother to be unconscious. For example, one shouldn’t

have to use logic to believe that 2+2=5, but accept it unconsciously as a fact; one must have

“a control over one’s own mental processes as complete as that of a contortionist” (242). An

orthodox person will “in all circumstances know, without taking thought, what is the true

belief or the desirable emotion” (241). Like the concept of “right and wrong,” we should not

need to be told that charity is good or that murder is bad but intuitively know so.

Unconsciousness prevents the masses from thinking critically and evaluating themselves and

their surroundings. Therefore, a Party member’s daily routine should be conducted without

questioning the purpose of his existence, if his full potential is being fulfilled, or if there is

fault in society.

In Fahrenheit 451, a set of values and a code of behaviour have been imposed upon

the people, while they remain ignorant of any social engineering. Beatty believes “We must

all be alike. Not everyone born free and equal, as the Constitution says, but everyone made

equal” (Bradbury, 65). Unconsciously, people strive to be the same, rejecting those who are

not orthodox. Montag did not consciously choose to be a fireman, but was influenced to be

one as his “grandfather and father were firemen” (58). Mrs. Montag betrays her husband

because she knows that it is only right and just that she should put the welfare of the Whole

before that of her husband and herself. Conversely, Clarisse McCellan, the girl next door who

changed Montag’s way of thinking, was decidedly unorthodox, and was killed because “she

didn’t want to know how a thing was done, but why” (67).

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IV. Censorship

The distortion of truth and the rewriting of history to suit the needs of the government

is a theme that occurs in both novels. In Nineteen Eighty-Four, the protagonist, Winston

Smith’s occupation is to change public records, literature, newspapers and the like so that

they are consistent with the version of truth that Big Brother, the governing figurehead of

Oceania, supplies to the public. Every time a speech or announcement is made, Winston must

search through every record he can find and alter it for consistency. Irrelevant or outdated

material is discarded into a “memory hole,” ironically a place where things are burned and

forgotten rather than remembered. There are things the party wishes people to be ignorant of,

such as the incremental decrease in the standard of living, freedom of speech and privacy;

and things that are not true but are told nonetheless, such as the existence of a time when Big

Brother did not exist. For example, the Ministry of Plenty decreases the chocolate ration, but

announces its increase, deceiving the public to believe they have more. Oceania is constantly

creating and dishonouring alliances with Eurasia and Eastasia in order to maintain global

sustained warfare; yet they pretend to have been allied with one or the other all along to

prevent suspicion of the Ministry of Defence. People are deluded in order to hide the flaws in

the system and give them no reason to want to disrupt the status quo.

In Fahrenheit 451, the truth is dealt with differently as the government has illegalised

literature and writing. They propose that literature contains too much emotion and can

therefore upset readers or cause controversy. Although the government wants people to be

happy, their underlying motive is for the public to be dim-witted, vacuous and

institutionalised. Literature contains all the ideas that oppose what they want in their people,

such as art, science, religion, philosophy and natural beauty, so they forbid it and employ

firemen to burn every book. The government in Fahrenheit 451 does not believe in the

aesthetic and creative value of books, but instead that it is a source of material that can harm

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its credibility and that “considering the age we live in… literature shall be first and foremost

propaganda.” (Essays, 335). History is also censored and altered in Fahrenheit 451 as we

learn from the firemen. When Guy Montag becomes curious about the original purpose of

firemen, Stoneman and Black show written in the Firemen rulebook:

“Established, 1790, to burn English-influenced books in the Colonies. First Fireman:

Benjamin Franklin” (Bradbury, 42).

While it is true that Franklin opened the first firehouse, the truth has nonetheless been

distorted as his presidency and scientific discoveries have been excluded (Joyce). Although

the misconception is subtle, the consequences are dire since this appears to be the only record

of Franklin and thus his entire legacy, save one detail, has been censored.

Fahrenheit 451’s government does not bother to subtly deceive the public but instead

destroys the source of rebellion; whereas in Nineteen Eighty-Four there is a totalitarian

regime that gives the appearance of being as democratic as possible but in reality is far more

deceptive.

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V. Enforcement

Although both dystopias differ in the ideals and purposes of their respective societies,

they enforce their rules in a similar way. In Fahrenheit 451, the law is enforced not only by

the police, but also the firemen, who seek out and destroy books, and the community, which

is able to identify and report illegal activity. Mildred’s visitors and herself ensure Montag is

punished for possessing books and the media is able to marshal residents to look out for

Montag when he is a fugitive.

In the same way, in Nineteen Eighty-Four the Thought Police play a major role in

enforcing the rules. Their purpose is to seek and detain “thoughtcriminals” – people who

have an inclination to rebel against Big Brother. To do this they go undercover and, spinning

a web of deception and artifice, they deceive thoughtcriminals into exposing and thereby

incriminating themselves. Party members believe that offenders are killed, or “vaporised,”

which provides the incentive not to rebel.

However, enforcement is only necessary in the short term because in a perfect

dystopia citizens need not be told how to behave but are naturally conditioned to do so.

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VI. Love and Fear

Machiavelli wrote in The Prince, that there are two ways for a leader to rule, either

through love or through fear. The government in Fahrenheit 451 uses fear whereas the

government in Nineteen Eighty-Four uses love. In Fahrenheit 451 people are discouraged

from having literary material because they know that if they are caught their lives are over.

Faber exemplifies this, as at first he does not want to fight and rebel against the government’s

desire to exterminate books because he fears what they might do to him in return.

Big Brother on the other hand has persuaded everyone to love him, so they do

whatever he asks. At the end of the novel Winston Smith has been broken down to a shell of

the man he once was and in the end he says that he “loved Big Brother”. Ultimately, this is

the effect that the Ministry of Love desires when they brought him in to “correct” him. All

characters in Nineteen Eighty-Four, apart from the “proles”, have only the most profound

love and respect for Big Brother. He has taken the role of God in this secular civilisation and

whatever he says is true, even if is completely or obviously contradictory or false.

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VII. Media

The use of the media in Fahrenheit 451 does not end with its ability to arrest

criminals. It is perhaps the most important method of control in their society. Without their

“four walls” television, people would have more free time to read literature, sit and discuss

morals and political views and be able to think more independently. The television deadens

all of this and instead turns people into lifeless drones. Mrs. Montag represents society as a

whole in the novel and is a perfect example of it. The primary purpose of television in

Nineteen Eighty-Four is not to entertain, as it might appear, but to crush the spirit of the

people. Television has reduced them to mindless vegetables and as it says in the novel, the

more nonsense that can be put inside a person’s head, the less room there is for

rebelliousness.

Television sets, or “Telescreens” as they are known in Nineteen Eighty-Four, have a

far more sinister purpose. They are placed in every single room of every single building in

the city to monitor everything everyone says does or think. They are almost omnipotent in

that they are so attentive to detail that they even know what you are thinking. The

Telescreens spy on people in order to find thoughtcriminals and so they are one of the Party’s

primary tools for “crimestop”.

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VIII. Collectivism

In obliterating familial and social ties between everyone and replacing these with

collectivist sentiments towards a public authority, the government has gained their confidence

and the ability to manipulate them. In Fahrenheit 451, Mrs. Montag shows us exactly this

with her betrayal of Guy and saying as she gets into the taxi, “Poor family, poor family, oh

everything gone, everything, everything gone now,” in reference to her television, proving

that she does not really care for her real family, which consists of her husband, Guy

(Bradbury, 122). She denounces him because of her fear of being seen as an accomplice to

Montag’s criminal activities as a book collector.

In Nineteen Eighty-Four, we find several instances where the wellbeing of society is

prioritised ahead of social relationships. The Party has succeeded in mutilating the instinctive

and fundamental relationship between child and parent. Party propaganda has driven a stake

between the two halves of the family by exploiting the impressionable minds of the children.

Children in this new era have been told to listen through keyholes and spy on their parents

and to inform the authorities if they hear of any clandestine activity. When Winston is

waiting in the Ministry of Love to be taken to the infamous Room 101, he meets Parsons who

is the father of such children:

“Who denounced you?” said Winston.

“It was my little daughter,” said Parsons with a sort of doleful pride. “She listened at

the keyhole. Heard what I was saying, and nipped off to the patrols the very next day. Pretty

smart for a nipper of seven, eh? I don’t bear her any grudge for it. In fact I’m proud of her. It

shows I brought her up in the right spirit, anyway (Orwell, 268).

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This quote summarises the fragile connections in a family. Allegiance towards an

authority is encouraged over loyalty to one’s parents and we find this to be common in both

novels. The fact that they are able to break the bonds between father and daughter or husband

and wife and forge new ones with an equal strength and vigour proves that they have an

almost limitless control over the general public.

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IX. Language

Language is often used in Nineteen Eighty-Four as a means of control but to a lesser

extent in Fahrenheit 451. The Party first of all has implemented “Newspeak” as a new and

improved way of communicating. In Newspeak, words are shortened, sentences condensed

and a multitude of words are simply omitted. As Syme puts it, they are “destroying words –

scores of them, hundreds of them everyday… [and] cutting the language down to the bone”

(Orwell, 59). The purpose of this is to limit the range of thought which people can use so they

become more machine-like. It is their theory that if they can put a stop to intelligent thought,

then they can completely crush the possibility of mutiny. The new vocabulary eliminates all

subtlety and shades of meaning in language because an entire range of words that express one

idea is condensed into a sing word. The beauty of Newspeak is that it makes thoughtcrime

impossible, as the very concept is inexpressible..

Orwell’s ideas are very similar to Benjamin Lee Whorf’s principle of Linguistic

Relativity. Whorf believed that differences in language could affect a culture both cognitively

and psychologically and even that as a result of this, one culture could be considered

intellectually superior to another (Gordon). The second method that the Party employs to

control thought is Doublethink. Doublethink is “the power of holding two contradictory

beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them” (Orwell, 244). It is a tool

used by the Party to allow people to swallow the lies fed to them without question and is at

the heart of the government’s tactics to keep its people on a short rein. When Winston Smith

is in the Ministry of Love, O’Brien teaches him how to love Big Brother and to become a

perfect Party member. He is told that he must accept whatever the Party tells him even if it is

nonsensical. O’Brien tells him that two plus two equals five and Winston is forced to believe

this. In such a vein, the Party slogans, which describe the nature of the Party’s fundamental

principles, are inundated with Doublethink: “War is Peace”, “Freedom is Slavery”, and

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“Ignorance is Strength”. War is peace because with sustained warfare they are able to instil

strong nationalism and thus give motivation for people to contribute to society. Freedom is

slavery because the one who is free cannot be a part of society or benefit from it. Ignorance is

strength because the strength of the Party lies with the peoples’ ability to remain ignorant of

the Party’s true motives, the lies it spreads and their real potential.

In Fahrenheit 451, much of the vocabulary has been modified. The characters that

appear on television are referred to as “family”. This shows how important a part of life

television has become. By renaming television in such a way, its role in society is elevated as

it comes to replace the traditional family as an outlet for emotion. Some words in Fahrenheit

451, which may have clear definition to the reader, are often given very different denotations.

The best example of this is the term “fireman,” because its true meaning is a person who

fights fire, yet Montag’s profession is quite the opposite of this. Clarisse uses language to

metamorphose Montag’s outlook on life as she Socratically poses piercing questions about

life and about him, ultimately causing his anagnorisis of the cultural damage in burning

books.

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X. Knowledge

Knowledge is a very dangerous thing and Big Brother strives to rid people of it. An

educated man poses a greater threat to the regime than anyone else because he knows that

things can and have been better, and he also knows what to do. Winston Smith is one of these

men because he learns about the way things used to be and he also knows that if it were

possible to unite the proletarians then there might be a way out. History is heavily censored

so that people cannot find the contradictions that have the power to undermine the Party.

In Plato’s allegory of the cave, men are chained up at the back of a cave, with only

shadows cast by the outside world to give them any indication of what is happening. One day,

a man is freed and explores the real world. Upon his return, he tells them about the wonderful

world outside, but finds that his friends do not want to leave as they are content with their

shadowy world (Plato, 240-48). Fahrenheit 451 draws a direct parallel to this story as the

salons, the “family” being but a shadow, a glimpse of reality, represent the shadows on the

wall. Guy Montag is liberated from his fetters and discovers literature and culture, believing

that “maybe the books can get… [them] half out of the cave,” but Mildred Montag will hear

none of it and shows genuine fear when faced by it (Bradbury, 81). Montag knows that the

shadows are meaningless and tries to lead the others to the light, but they insist he is the one

who is insane and living a lie. Manuel Valenzuela claims that the U.S. government is

deliberately “dumbing-down” its people through “gluttony and materialism,” in much the

same way as in Fahrenheit 451. “As television becomes parent, teacher, role model,

babysitter and entertainer to the child,” we are conditioned to adhere to the behavioural code

set out by the state.

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Culture, reason, knowledge and insight allow the mind to become free from the chains

of the government, however no one has any desire to become free because ignorance is all

they have ever known and all they ever want to know. They do not wish to venture into the

unknown because they are happy with what they have, and fear that they will lose all

meaning to their lives. In Fahrenheit 451, people are dimly aware that there exists a world

separate to their own in books, but they have been conditioned to think that it is an evil thing.

Those in Nineteen Eighty-Four however are clueless to reality and that is the way the

government would like it to stay.

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XI. Emotion

The government has also realised also the danger of emotion. Many steps are taken to

ensure that only basic emotions may exist and even then in a dulled state. Anger is

encouraged as shown in the “Two Minutes Hate” where people are shown images of

Emmanuel Goldstein. Driven to frenzy, Party members are made to release all their emotions

or frustrations of the day, conveniently towards a person who represents the disloyalty to and

resentment of Big Brother and everything that goes against his doctrine. When Winston and

Julia emerge from the Ministry of Love, the reader discovers that although unscathed, they

have become vacant shells of the people they once were. The author has made it clear that

this was O’Brien’s goal and his reason was that it was their love that was the truly rebellious

act. They have shifted their allegiance from Big Brother to each other and the primary

purpose of Room 101 was to induce them to betray each other. Faced by rats, his worst

nightmare, he finally tells O’Brien to “do it to Julia”.

Bradbury has used a different approach to demonstrate a society in which emotion is

discouraged. People can now be easily distracted from their emotions by going for long fast

drives, watching excessive amounts of television, going to the “Fun Park to bully people

around,” and smashing cars “in the Car Wrecker place” ( Bradbury, 27). When Montag says

he has an “awful feeling,” his wife recommends he “take the beetle” because she likes “to

drive fast when [she] feels that way” (71). The roaring sound, the speed and the adrenalin

drown out all negative emotions so that one forgets all about them. The disadvantage to this

is that such feelings are suppressed and are not dealt with, as they should be. The government

encourages this kind of behaviour, by making it illegal to be a pedestrian for example, so as

to keep people happy. They realise that if the general population is economically and

mentally satisfied, then they will have no reason to wish to depose the state.

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Montag’s world is severely impersonal and unfriendly. People do not care for each

other, and if they do then only superficially, while matters of great importance, such as the

death of a loved one, are given perfunctory consideration. Mildred’s friends show a great lack

of love for their husbands and they say that as soon as they die in war, they immediately

remarry. They also do not care for their children, drawing parallels between raising them and

doing the laundry. Bradbury has emphasised the point with the blithe language used by the

women as they talk about their life stories in a way that could be expected of someone

recounting an amusing anecdote. After Mildred attempts suicide, two men come to their

house to pump out her blood and replace it using a machine resembling a serpent. Montag

notes how “impersonal” and “strange” these men were and was affronted by the uncouth

manner by which they conducted their business. He felt that the new blood couldn’t really

replace Mildred and that they were not treating her as her human being, rather an assignment

to be completed with haste. Death is equally dehumanised as “five minutes after a person is

dead he’s on his way to the Big Flue;” (67) no acknowledgement of peoples’ lives are given

nor is a single tear shed.

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XII. Conclusion

By presenting methods of control in a dystopia, the reader can see in greater clarity

the issues involved in living in a society devoid of emotion and reason, devoid of humanity

and devoid of escape since none realise the necessity to do so. Irony is used to facilitate

visualisation of the methods due to the juxtaposition between elements designed to improve

society and the way government employs them for their own ends instead. Identification and

analysis of the methods of control, in Fahrenheit 451 and Nineteen Eighty-Four, undoubtedly

lead the reader to the question if there is solution to the problems posed by them. The main

goal of both authors is not to present a solution but to create awareness of the issues

presented by their novels and, of course, that “If there is hope, it lies in the proles” (Orwell,

80).

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XIII. Bibliography

Bradbury, Ray. Fahrenheit 451. London: Flamingo, 1993. Print.

Chaplin, Joyce E. The First Scientific American: Benjamin Franklin and the Pursuit of Genius. New York: Basic, 2006. Print.

Gordon, Marshall. “Sapir-Whorf hypothesis.” A Dictionary of Sociology. 1998. Encyclopedia.com. 24 Oct.2010 <http://www.enyclopedia.com>.

Machiavelli, Niccolò, and George Bull. The Prince. London: Penguin, 2003. Print.

Orwell, George. Nineteen Eighty-Four. London: Penguin, 2000. Print.

Orwell, George, Sonia Orwell, and Ian Angus. The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1970. Print.

Orwell, George. Homage to Catalonia. Harmondsworth: Penguin in Association with Secker & Warburg, 1989. Print.

Plato. “The Simile of the Cave.” The Republic. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 194. Print.

Valenzuela, Manuel. "The Dumbing Down of America." Information Clearing House. 12 Oct. 2006. Web. 19 Jan. 2011. <http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article15280.htm>.

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