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In the novel - ‘1984’ the two of the main themes of the book are love and rebellion. The significance of the role of love in the world generated by Orwell's creative imagination is already indicated by the fact that one of the four ministries in Oceania was “the ministry of love”,' which is in charge of the protection of order and enforcement of loyalty to Big Brother through fear. Since the principle of distorting concepts to the opposite, lies at the heart of the lifestyle of Oceania citizens, love here is similar to the hatred that is spread the country.
Winston and Julia’s love is a story very similar to Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet”. Firstly the way the characters met and fell in love. The fact that in the very beginning of the novels both characters had a strong hate for each other, which blossomed into love towards the end. Both romances were forms of mutiny and forbidden in the society that they lived in. They had to meet in secret and live in fear of others finding out. Sadly, both love stories ended in tragedies.
Before looking into how the love of the main characters is connected with rebellion, one should pay attention to how “The Party” and Big Brother treats love. Fundamentally, it is important to understand what happened between Winston and Julia, is seen at the beginning of part one :
“All marriages between Party members had to be approved by a committee appointed for the purpose, and -- though the principle was never clearly stated -- permission was always refused if the couple concerned gave the impression of being physically attracted to one another.” (chapter 6)
However, living in the conditions of the English socialist group, the love of the “Romeo and Juliet” of the Oceania epoch was initially doomed, because it is not a love story, but a story of escape into love.
If for Julia the opportunity to be with someone she loves is both a goal and a way of life, but for Winston, it is something from his past: his memory of love is destroyed by society because every person was himself, love is a dream of freedom, which remained an illusion.
The intimate relationships of the characters are strictly dependent on society. Winston's feelings and sensations are of a person who is completely under social and psychological oppression, and the “illegal” relationship with a woman does not change anything. Undoubtedly, both Winston and Julia are completely captured by the feeling that surged around them. However, they understand the meaning of love in their lives in different ways.
Looking closer we can see that love in ‘1984’ is nothing more than a tragedy, it is easy to notice that the situation is more of a love-hate story. Purposely, Julia is constantly associated with Winston's mother: she takes care of him, shortly before she disappears. The party dislikes relationships between the two genders because they don’t want passion and feelings in the way of their ruling, due to it becoming hard for them to control.
Love for Julia is portrayed as mundane. It appears to us as a parody of a religious allegory, and English socialism, stating the privacy of the sacred world, a fictional party, over the existing reality. It is precisely rejecting the love that Winston is offering. Only in this way O'Brien saves Winston, makes him “perfect”.
However, is “1984” really a love story, does Winston love Julia? The love is shown in this book a mixture of fear, hatred, and guilt. The only thing that could serve as proof of authenticity is the conviction of the characters, that they will not betray each other.
In the love for Julia comes the love for O'Brien. When during the torture Winston feels that he never loved him so much. And after being tortured in room 101, Winston is forced to believe that he loves Big Brother more than he loves Julia, and eventually he gives up his loyalty and love for Julia, after all the pain and suffering he has gone through mentally and physically and he says:
'Do it to Julia! Do it to Julia! Not me! Julia! I don't care what you do to her. Tear her face off, strip her to the bones. Not me! Julia! Not me!' (Part 3, Chapter 5)
Winston spends countless days in 101 until he eventually gives up his “love” for Julia and begins to love Big Brother. Although, previously in the novel, when Winston and Julia discuss love and betrayal, he says that:
'Confession is not betrayal. What you say or do doesn’t matter, only feelings matter. If they could make me stop loving you – that would be the real betrayal.'(Book 2, Chapter 7), which is a complete contradiction of what happened after room 101, which makes the readers wonder whether this is the end of the relationship between Winston and Julia, or if there is still hope that no matter what he says, that he still has feelings for her, and nothing could make him stop loving her.
This is a written love story, which tells not about how love is closely related to death, but also about how love dies and changes its form. “1984” is a unique novel in which lovers are not only destroyed or separated, but the very love that connects them is destroyed. Or, in other words, the general idea of love being demolished.
Certainly, the destruction of this idea has been carried out with appalling consistency: if lovers inevitably predetermine each other's futures, and if real feelings do not exist, then people would never want to take the same pain and suffering that Winston went through. The art of the world, waiting in room 101 is always the most terrible truth about itself because they could not love each other.
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