'Women In George Orwell's 1984'

George Orwell’s novel, 1984, is about a dystopian society that is controlled by big brother. The novel tells a story about Winston Smith, a rebel against big brother. Winston talks about very few women in the novel. Winston meets Julia and they fall in love. He feels as if he is in control of her and their relationship. Winston is seen as the typical man during this time period in which he believes that women are inferior to males. He does not put the needs of the women in his life above his own throughout the novel. Although Julia is one of the main characters, feminism literary critics have determined that women are looked down on in this dystopian society through multiple instances when women are treated as less than men in George Orwell's

These are the most common stereotypical roles for a woman during the 1940s, when the novel was written. Smith's mother is shown as emotional and not rational when Orwell states that she was not very intelligent but instead he thinks of her as noble because of her sacrifice of love for her children. His mother is shown as the one who cooked, cleaned, and took care of the children. Winston's wife is shown as passive and unintelligent because she is very obedient to the party without asking any questions. “She had without exception the most stupid, vulgar, empty mind that he had ever encountered” (Orwell 58). This shows that he thought that she was ignorant and easy to manipulate. Although Julia is different than these other women, she is still seen as ignorant by Winston because she falls asleep multiple times when he talks about the Party. Winston says that Julia is only a rebel from the waist down because she is only rebelling against the party for her own sexual satisfaction (Orwell 129). By only showing stereotypical profiles of women, Orwell leads the reader to notice the popular idea of the time that women are less than