1984 and other thoughts.

I just got back a few hours ago from my 4 day weekend in Bloomington. It was well worth the trip as always. It was great to see my lovely girlfriend Kim and my 3 cousins Alex, Jilayne, and Chaz. Unfortunately I can fairly say I went over my budget for the trip as I seem to do every time. I always run into unexpected expenses no matter how much I plan. Oh well. As I said before I definitely enjoy going there and it is worth it, even if I go a few bucks over budget. That is not to say it's not irksome though. I used to not be so anal about money. I don't know if I'm just getting more mature about it, or becoming a tightwad. I guess either outcome is possible. Kim pointed out that ever since the Canada trip I have been more aware of my money, which I suppose is true. The Canada Trip http://thisiscanada.blogspot.com/ was a rather costly en devour. I think part of it though is not so much a single moment in time but the gradual realization that I will have college coming up soon and it will indefinitely become a black hole on my bank account. Besides Christmas is just around the corner and I can't underestimate the cost of that either.

Driving home tonight gave me couple solid hours to finish my latest muse of an audio novel. 1984 By George Orwell. In short, the book is none short of profound. However I owe it more than such a short description.

The Book was written in 1948 and provides a dystopian view of the future through Orwell's politically charged imagination. The novel centers around Winston Smith a middle class person living in the totalitarian society of Oceania. Winston dares to stray from the ideals of the party and "big brother" the famous character from the Novel. This is the main focus of the plot.

The novel was really gripping for a number of reasons. The first reason was that I felt like Orwell was way ahead of his time (literally) in how the novel was written. The language was clear and concise and the way he paints out the lifestyle of "the future" is in many ways strikingly real. Orwell also provides a lot of good characterization and details to bring the novel to life. However the main reason why this book blew my mind was how disturbing it was and how easily it got under my skin. Not only does Orwell describe the utter dehumanization of millions of people but he makes it seem so painful tangible. While I read the book I remembered thinking several times how glad I am to have the simple freedoms our society and government allows. For example the blog I'm writing at this moment is an exercise in Freedom of Speech. In the society from the book I would have been killed for "thought crime." While this might seem absurd the more one thinks about it the more possible it appears that a government entity with enough power has the power to completely control a human being. One of the abilities of the government in the book was the ability to control peoples minds. The scary thing is it wasn't by some futuristic technology but rather the total control of all media so as to completely control the information that people received regardless of it were true or not. The Novel ultimately begs the question, What if a Stalin/Hitler esque Totalitarian society was able to survive and evolve? It is something that is not totally unthinkable. Also what if the said society was able to realize its own evil and accept it as a means to gain power for the mere lure of power itself.

This was definitely an awesome read, and I highly recommend it. However it obviously wasn't much of a feel good book. In fact the only redemption it offers might be the warning it hides beneath it's pages.

That's about all I got tonight,




Sam