Wednesday, December 19, 2012

The importance of rats

While Winston and Julia are in the room above Mr.Charrington  and they lie in the bed after loving each other a random visitor appears. A rat appears scaring Winston immensely. Why is the rat there? what is the purpose of the appearance of the rat and why is Winston so afraid of it? 
Would you agree to say that the rat is foreshadowing an event? I personally believe that the rat intrudes in the perfect little world that Winston and Julia have created from themselves to demonstrate that nothing is ever safe. They will be caught and there is nothing one could do about it. The rat is a very important and loaded symbol I would like to hear your opinions on. Rats are known for representing horror scenarios and are known to bring terrible things along with them like disease. Furthermore they are connected to the underworld, they know their way through underground tunnels and travel through the secret but of life. What would you say is the importance of the role of the rat? 

http://www.google.com/imgres?q=rat+sketch&um=1&hl=de&safe=strict&client=safari&tbo=d&rls=en&biw=984&bih=680&tbm=isch&tbnid=cb8NGnTvzaPE6M:&imgrefurl=http://katarinasart.com/sketchbook.html&docid=OUD_MPIVSuR_gM&imgurl=http://katarinasart.com/ratsketch.gif&w=307&h=223&ei=k7nRUPjSFKnP0QWLsYG4Bg&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=579&vpy=134&dur=499&hovh=178&hovw=245&tx=103&ty=131&sig=104706566274776253960&page=1&tbnh=138&tbnw=187&start=0&ndsp=23&ved=1t:429,r:4,s:0,i:96

3 comments:

  1. Thank you Tina for posting this, especially after discussing this in class. I agree with you that the rats foreshadow a certain event or thing. At first I think that the rat indicates that anything can destroy Winston and Julia's little romance an their world of privacy. Secondly, I think it is very interesting that we now know one of Winston's greatest fears. Also the fact that rats remind me of the cruelty that they had to undergo during the Mid-eve. The cruel advances only indicate that something cruel will happen to Winston.

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    1. I agree with you, Helen that the rat indicates that anything can destroy Winston and Julia's relationship - although I wouldn't quite use the word "destroy" perhaps disturb? I actually didn't think so deeply about this symbol but now that you bring it up it is a rather important symbol. More important than the fact that we know of Winston's greatest fears, I think is the authorial choice to place a rat. According to the Oxford Dictionary, a rat can be "an unpleasant person, especially one who is not loyal and who tricks somebody" and also there are various phrasal verbs such as "to rat on somebody" or to "rat somebody out to somebody" and they all mean to tell somebody in authority about something wrong that somebody else has done. And in the successive chapters we also learn why Orwell made the rat appear in Mr.Charrington's flat... Close-readers could read a lot from this seemingly minor detail

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  2. I love looking back at things like this reading further into the book. In that Winston and Julia were 'ratted' out so to speak by Mr. Charington and O'Brien. I hope to find that the rat shows up again so it doesn't just end with Orwell making it just an ironic snippet in the book.

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