Year 12 IB Extended Essays 2018

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shapeliness of her hips” (Orwell, 2008, p. 11). The sash, supposedly a symbol of chastity, is described here as an erotic item of clothing. This illustrates the government’s inability to completely remove Julia’s instinctual sexual feelings. The sash that seems to mark Julia’s submission to the anti-erotic policies of a Party that aspires to “abolish the orgasm” (Orwell, 2008, p. 256), actually makes her an object of desire for Winston, whose sexuality is bound up in his nascent resistance to the regime. In the first physical encounter between Winston and Julia, readers are confronted with romantic clichés and fantasies about submissive women and virile men as “[Julia] turn[s] her face up and [Winston kisses her] wide red mouth” (Orwell, 2008, p. 115) Orwell employs similar tropes to those seen in the romance novel genre by describing her “arms about his neck, [as] she [calls] him darling, precious one, loved one” (Orwell, 2008, p.115). The romantic discourse in the trysts between Julia and Winston defies the regulations of Newspeak. Through the relationship between Julia and Winston, Orwell is demonstrating that the desire for connection defines humanity and it cannot simply be eliminated by government restrictions. Both Julia and Winston see their sexual relationship as a way of breaking free from government control and reasserting their individuality. Father of modern psychology, Sigmund Freud, also recognized that sexual union could be an assertion of individuality. He wrote, “two people coming together for the purpose of sexual satisfaction, in so far as they seek solitude, are making a demonstration against the herd instinct, the group feeling” (cited in Beauchamp, 1973). This sense of breaking away from the herd encourages Winston to view his relationships with Julia as a “political act… [a] blow struck against the party” (Orwell, 2008, p. 121). Winston recognizes the force that could “tear the Party to pieces...[is not] merely the love of one person, but the animal instinct” (Orwell, 2008, p. 120). Sex therefore becomes a way for them to resist Big Brother and have an aspect of their lives that the regime cannot touch.