GMei+1984

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Grant Mei

I think chapter 4 is about how Winston is the real villain in the story. Although Big Brother is the actual superpower with the ability to make people do his bidding, Winston is his voice. In the chapter, Winston wrote a speech for him about a fake person who goes by the name of Comrade Ogilvy in place of a Comrade Withers. Ogilvy is a man who is supposedly an ideal member of the Party and with his creation, makes the government and Big Brother look much better. Big Brother just enforces the totalitarian government, but Winston actually promotes it by creating Ogilvy an ideal man in which proletariats should look up to. Winston writes a speech about praising Comrade Ogilvy instead of Comrade Withers for Big Brother, so Winston is actually pulling the strings here. He uses his ideas and voice and just has Big Brother speak out to people instead of him. People listen to Big Brother, and because Big Brother will soon get a speech from Winston, the people actually listen to Winston. Winston manipulates the people of Airstrip One using Big Brother as a medium from his world to the real world. In terms of chess, Big Brother is the king of the chessboard and Winston is but a pawn. In chess, who fights the battles? The pawns do. It is also said that history is written by the victor, and Big Brother can't be the victor if he doesn't fight the battle. Winston is the pawn, he fights the battles, and he is rewriting history in the Ministry of Truth. Winston is the one that is altering the history as it once was, not Big Brother. Referring to Julius Caesar, Big Brother is an evil dictator just like the former. In totalitarian governments such as the one in 1984, all the people of the lower caste do the work. The assassination of Julius Caesar was caused by none other than people below his caste as he was stabbed to death. He was killed because he was evil, but the act of killing him was evil itself, creating a paradox of events because killing him was not only evil, but for justice. Evil and justice are opposite things, in which create a paradox. Winston is the evil mastermind subconsciously and unknowingly because chapter 4 explains how he turns the tables and gets Big Brother to do his own bidding by writing a speech for him and letting Big Brother turn all of the people in Airstrip One into his little mind puppets. In retrospect, Winston state that he likes to think, and the greatest masterminds are excellent thinkers. Winston is the puppeteer, secretly using everyone else as his marionettes and running the show. Winston is definitely the evil villain in this.