Consider also that we get only two points of view on Oceania: Goldstein and Smith. Goldstein's analytic exposition seems to indicate a sound head on his shoulders, and to double check his claims[1], we may verify that nearly everything he writes is, with minor adjustments, applicable to our world as well as to his. Smith[2], on the other hand, shows signs of paranoid delusions[3] and narcissism[4] up through chapter 9 of the fast-forward. Is he an entirely reliable narrator from chapter 10 onward? Is he even awake[5]?

Part IV, Chapter 1: Winston could hear the birds through the open window. Julia already had the kettle on, bubbling quietly, and she spoke as she rummaged for the tea tin. "Sleepyhead, you shouldn't fall asleep while reading. Not only did I have to replace your book in the bookshelf this morning, but you woke me up twice, whimpering during the night. Did you have a bad dream, darling?" ...

[1] Compare ancient Theban warnings about regurgitating a media line without double checking its claims: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24737221

[2] One of the drones from Sector 7G of MiniTru. They all went to Nottingham, York, etc., so they're certainly not given any important tasks which could be screwed up, but since they do have degrees they still must be given some kind of make work, and (as someone in the work assignment ministry had only skimmed Smith's dossier, putting it down immediately the tea lady came by, and so hadn't realised the effect the nature of this position might have on his innate shaky grip on reality) they are charged with correcting errors in automatically generated transcripts (given the awful state of their cigarette machines is it any wonder the translation machine is so off base so frequently?), which somehow Smith has managed to Mitty up into a fantasy of rewriting, in the grand manner, truth.

[3] Of course Syme isn't listed in the rota on the office bulletin board any longer. He hasn't been disappeared. He's been promoted and now works at MiniPlen, so his name now appears on their office rotas.

[4] What kind of adult male would run to a woman to whom he hasn't been introduced, whose notion of flirting and courtship reduces entirely to exploiting an (alleged) injury in making a drop, as if she were not a lover but a dealer? One would have to be both immature and pretty full of oneself to not run away from that one, double time.

[5] Goldstein does leave us with the question of "why should human equality be averted?" and so Freud might say that Smith's dreams correspond to his subconscious attempting to answer that question. In this case, Smith's id dreams up an insidious totalitarian grand conspiracy theory (paralleling Smith's waking fantasies about his job) in which the Inner Party (which he failed to join entirely due to his poor A-level marks) is motivated exactly like the bullying teenage (they are from the cream of society: both rich and thick) schoolboys of his author's own experience, as a swotter on scholarship at a second-rate boarding school. This motive really consists...