the play: narrative technique

Let's talk about the narrative technique in the play. What did you guys think about how flashback was blended with the interrogation? What was the effect on meaning? What did it say about the interrogators? Was the blond interrogator Julia?

i thought that it was a very unique technique and it was a good idea. i thought that it was very interesting how they used the interigators to act out what he had written in his diary. it was kind of confusing at times because sometimes you didn't really know if they were acting out the diary or if they were still interogating.

I think the replay of the story was a sort of new and interesting idea. They were able to split Winston's lines to avoid over using the prisoner character. It also gave an insight to the way the interegators will do anything for their job and duty.

cgiraud wrote:

Let's talk about the narrative technique in the play. What did you guys think about how flashback was blended with the interrogation? What was the effect on meaning? What did it say about the interrogators? Was the blond interrogator Julia?

I Liked the flashback, becuse it allowed people to see how events happened, and especially because it seemed like flashbacks tortured Winston more. I don't think that the blond interrogator was Julia, that girl was just acting to make Winstons interrogation more intense.

The flashback narrative kind of confused me because it's hard to tell if it was just a flahsback or if the party members were actually acting it out. I noticed that some people were getting bored and part of that could be contributed by the fact that there really was no physical flashback and no scene change so the lack of change kind of made some scenes drag on. Something I thought was interesting was that even though the Party members are supposed to reprisent the state and not have any emotions, they would start to peek through periodically anyway and that was a good way to show that the government can't completely control the way you feel. Yes the women was Julia because there was a time when they were talking about Julia betraying his much faster than anyone else, the Party member was covering her face with her hands and moving around a lot. She even screamed for him to keep shutting up when he said "we're not at war with Eastasia!"

I really liked the split narrative. There was an actor portraying Winston in flashbacks, and another portraying Winston as he was watching his flashbacks.

I really believed that the blonde interrogator was Julia. It was ironic because the entire time Winston is screaming for Julia, she's standing in front of him, or she's torturing him. It makes sense since O'Brien said at the end, "You wouldn't even recognized her." The actress sort of froze and Winston didn't even recognize her.

I think that the flashbacks blended with the interrogation was a genius idea because it showed the audience just how powerful the play was because it showed that you didn't need a whole cast to act out the play. Even though there was only six actors, the audience definitely felt the impact. Also, I think that the fact that the actors played both parts was a great way to show how much power Big Brother had over them because they very abruptly went from mocking a sex scene to being these extremely serious party members. I do believe that the interrogator was Julia. During the play, I noticed that she was acting differently from the other interrogators. For example, when Winston was asked the finger question and he kept answering four, she said, "Just say five!" This showed that she didn't want to see Winston get hurt anymore. At the beginning of the play, she didn't seem to have any connection towards Winston because she had forgotten about their affair, but when she re-inacted the scenes, she started remembering.

At first this was way confusing! Once I realized the interrogators were acting out flashbacks, it made a lot more sense. I found it a very creative way of telling the story. Sometimes I couldn’t tell if the interrogators were just acting it out as Big Brother wanted them to or if they were beginning to have their own feelings form. Like when the man acting as Winston said, “She loves me” instead of “She loved him” and the other Party interrogators freaked out. I’m still kind of undecided on whether or not the blond interrogator was Julia. Some aspects make me think she is; others not so much.

The narrative technique was very clever. For the first half of the performance, I was confused but I understood it for the second half. Sometimes I was unsure about whether the interrogators were acting out his diary or if they were expressing their own feelings. The blond woman who acted out Julia made me confused. Well, not confused per se, but at the end, I kept thinking that she was actually Julia instead of the interrogator.

Kimolo wote I was unsure about whether the interrogators were acting out his diary or if they were expressing their own feelings. The blond woman who acted out Julia made me confused

I think the interrogators were both acting out the story to better understand it, and at times expressing their own feelings.

The interrogators acted like they weren't feeling anything while acting the flashbacks, but you could tell that they felt excited, jealous, upset, angry, anxious. No the female interrogator couldn't have been julia I think. Because Winston would've had a stronger reaction to her. Why would Big Brother make her interrogate someone she worked with unless to get more info, but they already had it.

At first the way they worked the narration in with the interigation was really confusing to me but once I figured it out I thought it was really clever. I thought that this made the effect all that much stronger because these people are willing to act out these crimes to "cure" him.

I feel that the interrogators relived the story in the diary to put Winston’s mind in motion. By reliving everything he had done, they got more details from him and were able to questions him while the memory of the situation was fresh. I feel that this was a very good idea because Winston felt like he was living in the memory and was able to recall all the details. When you want the truth, the best way to get it is to recreate the original scene and try to give as much support to the memory. The way they went about the interrogation created the greatest amount of truth and the most vivid details.
I don’t really know if the woman interrogator is supposed to be the real Julia. She is playing the part of Julia in the interrogation so by the end, I had it in my head that she is Julia. O’Brien also says that Winston would “no longer recognize her” which makes us think that she is right there. Throughout the entire questioning process, the woman is sympathetic to Winston and shows more mercy than the others but there is no way to tell because it was left unanswered.

I think it was a good way to easily show all of the story without having to show all of the setting, character, and costume changes a book can have. It was kind of hard to figure out exactly how they were doing it, but that was only for the first few minutes, after that it was easy to understand.
As for if the blond woman was actually Julia, I think that's up in the air. I don't really know. I would have to watch the play again and specifically watch for clues to get a good idea.

This showed that the interrigators were in as deep as everyone else. they had no choice but to do this too. It comes off like the interrigators have more freedom and choices than Winsten Smith but they dont, they are forced probably agenst their will to do this. and the "Julia" looking girl was probably put there to affect his decisions in the play because Big Brother lost his love for Julias, and they needed him to relize that his love for BB is more important than his for Julia.

i could buy into the julia/government agent thing. It makes sense with the evident trends of the play. The perpetual display of absolute power would blend with the characters values. Because Julia placed her belief so strongly in the thought that the government can ever control everything, if you flipped her around, she would believe that the government was right and she might as well work for them.

(Also in the play, when she lingered too long after a kiss or maybe they held hands (?), everyone else noticed and made it a bigger deal.)

I think the way the play mixed the interrogation and the real events of the play was very interesting and added to the overall effect of the play. Since everyone played multiple parts in the story, it was easy to associate between character. Yes, i believe the female interragator was Julia

i thought that it combined well. it took all of the power away from the main character and gave it to the government that controlled everything.

I didn't think that what the interrogators were acting out were flash backs. I thought that they were reacting the entire situation so that it would remind Winston what was going on. Maybe it would remind him of something he forgot to write in his diary. I also never thought of the blonde woman as Julia because she played other characters and would get out of character. The part where the blonde lady yells at Winston to say 5, I thought of it as a way to show how some the the interrogators became attatched to Winston and his story.

The narrative was an interesting tecnique to minimize the length of the story by highlighting important parts. It shows the humanistic qualities of the interrigators while they "break the rules" of big brother. The blond interrigator resembles Julia and could very well be Julia. But it was a bit confusing to tell whether or not the interrigators were acting or really feeling emotions for one another.