1984

Winston Smith

Winston Smith is a low-ranking Outer Party clerk in the Ministry of Truth, where he rewrites historical records to fit the Party line. Restless and quietly skeptical, he becomes the lens through which the reader experiences the suffocating mechanisms of a totalitarian state—his private doubts, small acts of defiance, and search for authenticity illuminating the novel’s themes of truth, memory, and control.

Julia

Julia works in the Party’s Fiction Department and publicly plays the role of a model citizen, yet privately she’s a pragmatic rebel who seeks small, personal freedoms. She becomes a crucial counterpart to Winston, channeling defiance through lived experience and sensuality rather than abstract ideology, and her presence sharpens the novel’s themes of intimacy, autonomy, and resistance under totalitarian rule.

O'Brien

A high‑ranking Inner Party intellectual, O’Brien draws Winston’s attention with his air of confidence and insight, embodying the regime’s sophisticated power and ideological rigor. He serves as a pivotal figure in Winston’s journey, representing the lure—and the danger—of understanding the Party’s inner workings without revealing key plot turns.

Big Brother

Big Brother is the omnipresent leader and symbol of the Party’s authority in a totalitarian state, his image used to inspire devotion, fear, and conformity. Though rarely (if ever) seen in person, he embodies surveillance and control, shaping citizens’ thoughts and behavior and anchoring the regime’s propaganda.

Emmanuel Goldstein

Emmanuel Goldstein is the regime’s designated arch-enemy and the alleged leader of a shadowy resistance, used by the Party as a focus for fear and hatred during mass propaganda events. His writings and image serve as a catalyst for the protagonist’s doubts and symbolize forbidden thought and dissent within Oceania, whether or not he truly exists as portrayed.

Mr. Charrington

Mr. Charrington is the quiet proprietor of a shabby antiques shop who indulges Winston’s curiosity about relics and old songs, providing a rare space and pretense of privacy. Through his calm manner and knowledge of the past, he becomes a conduit for Winston’s fascination with history and a catalyst for choices that shape the novel’s middle acts, while embodying the fragile allure of a world before the Party.

Parsons

Parsons is Winston’s garrulous neighbor and a model Outer Party loyalist—cheerfully unquestioning, forever organizing community activities, and proud of his indoctrinated children. He embodies the regime’s ideal everyday follower, illustrating how enthusiasm and conformity help sustain the Party’s control.

Syme

Syme is a brilliant philologist at the Ministry of Truth, working on the Eleventh Edition of the Newspeak dictionary. A fervent believer in Party doctrine, he explains with gleeful precision how Newspeak will narrow the range of thought, serving as a foil to Winston and illustrating the regime’s intellectual control and the hazards of being conspicuously clever in Oceania.

Katherine

Katherine is Winston Smith’s estranged wife, a dutiful Party loyalist whose rigid orthodoxy and mechanical view of intimacy embody the regime’s intrusion into private life. Her presence in Winston’s memories underscores his emotional isolation and the Party’s effort to subdue personal desire and genuine connection.

Ampleforth

Ampleforth is a poet and philologist assigned to rewrite pre‑Revolutionary verse so it conforms to Party doctrine, a task that exposes the regime’s strangling grip on art and language. His fussy loyalty to rhyme and words, set against the Party’s demands, quietly illustrates how even harmless intellectuals are ensnared by totalitarian control, adding texture to the novel’s portrayal of cultural and ideological repression.