I was wondering if someone could look at my comparative analysis essay, thankyou!!
A necessary prerequisite of totalitarianism is, according to both ‘Nineteen-Eighty Four’ and ‘Stasiland’, the relinquishing of humanity, through the repression of freedom and autonomy. George Orwell's fictitious dystopia ‘Nineteen-Eighty Four’ and Anna Funders myriad of personal stories, ‘Stasiland’, reveal the ways in which autocratic regimes attempt to disavowal individuals of their humanity. Surveillance is used as a catalyst through which the SED and the Party seek to restrict individuals from forging a sense of self identity, whilst this imposition of constant scrutiny within an oppressive environment works to obliterate the humanity of its citizens and consequently leaves the lives of many permanently damaged. However, it is through Winston which Orwell elucidates the rule of the Party will ‘never cease’ and with it the capitulation of humanity. It is also a point of contrast to Funder’s post GDR dissection, in which she reveals the potential of humanity to overcome an authoritarian society.
Although starkly different, the physical setting of both texts provide a window into the oppression faced by the citizens of Oceania and East Germany, and in turn a world that threatens the destruction of humanity. Devoid of any aesthetic merit, the setting of Oceania conveys the constant surveillance that invades the lives of its citizens and therefore leaves little room to forge a sense of identity. The opening pages communicates a society constructed on fear and repression through the world of ‘no colour’, amalgamated with telescreens that ‘watch everybody all the time’, roaming helicopters and the ominously encroaching eyes of Big Brother, all are ever present reminders of their lack of free will. It is the reality of living beneath the omniscient glare of the Party that Orwell reveals the futility of rebellion, and thus the emancipation of humanity. Although the overriding atmospheric fear that is pervasive in Oceania, is not evident in Funders text. it is the repression of individuality and freedom through the landscape of the GDR, which works to compromise the humanity of its citizens that, we can draw parallels to Stasiland. Funder likens her descriptions of East Germany to that of Lewis Carroll's ‘Alice in Wonderland’, the huge empty spaces of Alexandraplatz, ‘designed to make people feel small’, Funder sardonically notes ‘it works’, even on her, a free individual, suggesting individuals were confined in a society intended to restrict individual agency. Paired with the various means and methods employed by the Stasi from ‘telephone tapping...informers...bugs’ all of which actively seek to undermine individuality, it is through the oppressive features that are the hallmarks of this environment that citizens of the GDR are stripped of their autonomy. Thus, despite the Stasi being unable to impose such stringent limitations like those within Oceania, both environments are sufficiently void of opportunity for individual entities to thrive.
The culture of fear and repression of individuality which dominates both Stasiland and 1984 reveal the damaging and long lasting effects that a totalitarian regime has on the human psyche in a bid to strip them of their humanity. Funders dual role as polemis journalist and therapist enables her interviewers an emotional catharsis and unload the traumatic, psychological baggage of their pasts. With Julia being the epitome of the terrible damage wrought by exposure to inhumanity for decades. Through the manner in which she conducts herself, paired with her idiosyncrasies, it is apparent that discussions regarding her past educe desolation and misery. Julia’s catchphrase, ‘long story’, indicates her unwillingness to divulge the extreme details of her past, and would rather ‘whisk back into [her] shell’. Her now aimless wonderlust is reflective of her ostracism from society, a woman whose life has been brutally marred both before and after the Wall, indicating the permanency of damage a tyrannical rule can have on the human soul. It is through Julia which Funder reveals the capacity of the human spirit to endure, though not without consequence, in the face of an overwhelming and all-powerful totalitarian regime. The pressure imposed on citizens of the GDR to renounce their humanity in favour of the ideology of the State has left many of their lives ‘shaped by the wall’, much in the same way Winston’s life has been mutilated at the hands of the Party. Despite his crusade to preserve his own humanity, in the face of a state that has no purpose but that of power, Winston is forced to concede to the ideology of the State. Inside Room 101 Winston is ‘reduced’ to merely a shell for Ingsoc rhetoric, a man who no longer questions the truth of the telescreen reports and who believes without conscious objection, that ‘2+2 = 5’, indicating that the emancipation of humanity is inevitable. The culture of fear invested in both Oceania and the GDR demands the reunification of individuality and uniqueness from it citizens in order to conform to the expectations of an oligarchical leadership.
Winston Smith’s submissive declaration of love to a monolithic figure head he detests, suggests that the capitulation of humanity, is inevitable. Whilst, the hopefulness of Funders retrospective narrative presents a different assessment of the potential of totalitarianism to destroy the human soul. The landscape of trauma which superimposes East German society, with its green tinged aura from the outset of Stasiland, contrasts starkly with Funder’s final observations, where “sunbathers loll” and teenagers “kiss”. This moment of clarity highlights the dramatic change Funder has experienced since the beginning of her journey, her newly gained faith that, whilst to some extent “the wall and what it stood for do still exist”, the future is optimistic and “bright” for the people of the East Germany. Funder gives the impression that she has been released from the Wonderland; like Alice, she has resurfaced and admires things about her world that was so heavily tainted by the memories of the Stasi, that she “never noticed” its simple beauty. Therefore suggesting that only if we persist, we may be able to overcome past impediments and thus hope still remains for humanity. The relatively light and happy conclusion to Stasiland contrasts tragically with the bleak parable presented by Orwell in the denouement of 1984. WInstons humanity is in the end challenged by O'Brien whose devastating revelation that it is power for powers sake that drives the Party, is a confronting realisation that facilitates his irreversible conversion to the Party. His self willed exile, in which he “had won the victory over himself” implies there is little hope for humanity, for Winston had ‘broken’ himself and he alone. Further heightened by the knowledge that he had always known ‘his grave was there and waiting for him’ insinuates that the capitulation of humanity was predestined, in the end there will be no humanity for ‘humanity is the Party’. Whilst Orwell illustrate the immense power of the ruling Party to eradicate the human spirit, and thus individuals inability to resist the pressures faced by an autocratic society, Funder suggests that coming to terms with past traumas, although an arduous task, is a process that has already begun
Many of the events in ‘Nineteen-Eighty Four’ seem so removed from reality; constant surveillance, the lack of a private sphere and the indoctrination of the population, however, Funder reveals that such a life can still be, and indeed was, forced upon people. Her inflective journey exposes how this fiction become reality, the supposedly fantastical methods employed by Ingsoc are not so far from reality after all. Even after the oppression ends, Funder details that for some its effects have essentially eclipsed, with many still living within the former GDR with “mauer im kopf”, the “wall in the head”. For Orwell, the enduring impacts of a totalitarian rule on the innate human spirit, parallels with Funder’s, in which Winstons is finally culminated into his submissive love to an ostensible figurehead. However both texts serve as a warning to humanity, a resistance against forgetting that if we allow our societies to impinge on our freedoms we will lose any sense of individuality.
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