As Winston sits before the blank diary page, we are told that his ulcerous are sore, for what could this ulcerous be an objective correlative

Winston feels dead inside. He looks much older than he is and has ailments that older people have. His ulcer is representative of his oppression. It is a symbol of his crumbling exterior to mach his dying interior.

I suppose the ulcer is a correlative or manifestation of his rotting life. The diary presents Winston with the potential for some kind of, although small, emotional catharsis. The emotions the act of writing in his diary can be correlative to his itchy ulcer. The ulcer often bothers Winston in times of stress.

I took an extra literature class for fun a few years ago; it was more of a book club and discussion through Barnes and Noble (Barnes and Noble University),but I wanted to something different........ I spend my days in a classroom with 14 years olds, anyway adult conversation is always welcome.

1984, was one of the novels we used......... I've read it more than a few times, but you always have to go back, and I've never read a novel I didn't learn something new from the next time around. During one of our discussions Winston's ulcer came up; it was described as symbolic. The ulcer is located on his ankle, and like Aslan has already mentioned bothers him during times of stress......... that I knew. What I had never thought about (and something only a psychologist would bring up) is that the ulcer represents sexual repression. Morning itches were brought up, as was the fact that it didn't bother him after he and Julia became an item............ and that it became engorged when they stopped seeing each other.

I laughed for five minutes when it was brought up but eventually saw that he was somewhat accurate, and that it was possible. So if you want to go for a different twist.......... go for it.

Winston and everyone say a movie, why do you suppose that he and the audience are not sickend by the horror of what they see????

I think Winston is sickened by what he sees but perhaps not in the same way you or I might feel. The Jewess blown to bits with her child elicits cheers and laughter from the audience. They are brainwashed. The outer party drones are accustomed to act the same way out of fear and social conditioning. Their only social grounding is their immersion in party propaganda from day one of their lives. Winston knows better but his reaction is more of sadness and confusion than anything else.

To my opinion Winston's ulcer is very important in the book, it seemed that nobody is ever cared enough for the health of that society's people, it is a sign of the bad life-conditions the people of that society had to live in, nobody seemed to have cared enough or nobody could have cared enough for such problems, as I think people very much had enough to suffer from their own life-problems, it is also a sign for the fact that a 'normal' sexual love-relation isn't allowed in that society, there is only need of sex, for the sake of begetting children for the party, preferable through the means of artificial insemination, but if that's not (readily) possible, than through the means of 'normal' sexual contact, but than between a man and a woman who preferable are not that very well are 'matching' with each other and also that the woman has no joy of it!