1984 Page #5

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an effort of the will.

Do you remember writing in your diary:

"Freedom is the freedom to say

two plus two equals four"?

Yes.

How many fingers am I holding up?

Four.

And if the Party says there are not four,

but five, then how many?

Five.

No.

That's no use. You're lying.

How many fingers, please?

Four. What else could I say?

Five, or anything you like.

Will you please stop it?

Stop the pain.

How can I help it?

How can I help

what I see in front of my eyes?

Two and two makes four.

Sometimes, Winston.

Sometimes they are five,

sometimes they are three.

Sometimes they are all of them at once.

Neither the past, nor the present,

nor the future...

exists in its own right.

Reality is in the human mind...

not in the individual mind...

which makes mistakes and soon perishes...

but in the mind of the Party...

which is collective and immortal.

-Again.

-No.

How many fingers, Winston?

Four.

Four, I suppose there are four.

I tried to see five.

I wish I could.

Which do you wish?

To persuade me that you can see five,

or really to see them?

Really to see them.

Again.

How many, Winston?

I don't know.

Better.

No one escapes, Winston.

There are no martyrs here.

All the confessions made here are true.

We do not destroy the heretic

because he resists us.

As long as he resists us,

we never destroy him.

We make him one of ourselves

before we kill him.

We make his brain perfect

before we blow it out.

And then...

when there is nothing left

but sorrow and love of Big Brother...

we shall lift you clean out of history.

We shall turn you into gas

and pour you into the stratosphere.

Nothing will remain of you.

Not a name in a register.

Not a memory in a living brain.

You will be annihilated in the past,

as well as in the future.

Three thousand.

This time it won't hurt you.

Before we bring this session to an end...

I want you to ask me your questions.

I want you to clear your mind.

Julia.

She betrayed you, Winston...

immediately, unreservedly.

All her rebellion, deceit,

folly, dirty-mindedness...

has been turned out of her.

Does Big Brother exist?

Of course.

The same way as me?

You do not exist.

You've not asked me the question

that is uppermost in your mind.

You know what is in Room 101.

Everyone knows what's in Room 101.

Now...

fix your eyes on mine.

What country is Oceania at war with?

I don't remember.

Oceania is at war with Eastasia.

Do you remember that now?

Yes.

How many fingers am I holding up?

Five.

You see, at least, that it is possible.

You've understood the reality of the past...

and of the present.

Now for the future.

A question:

"How does one man

assert power over another?"

By making him suffer.

Exactly. Obedience is not enough.

Power is inflicting pain and humiliation.

Otherwise, you cannot be sure.

Power is tearing human minds apart...

and putting them together again

in new shapes of your own choosing.

Power is not a means, it is an end.

In our world, there will only be triumph

and self-abasement.

Everything else, we shall destroy.

The past is forbidden. Why?

Because when we can cut man

from his own past...

then we can cut him from his family,

his children, other men.

There is no loyalty,

except loyalty to the Party.

There is no love, except love of Big Brother.

All competing pleasures, we will destroy.

If you want a vision of the future, imagine...

a boot stamping on a human face forever.

You are thinking

that my face is old and tired...

that while I talk of power...

I'm unable to prevent

the decay of my own body.

But the individual is only a cell.

And the weariness of the cell

is the vigor of the organism.

-You'll fail.

-Why?

It's impossible.

Hatred, the fear of life.

Why is hate less vital than love?

I don't know.

But somehow you'll fail.

Something will defeat you.

Life will defeat you.

We control life at all levels.

We create human nature.

Men are infinitely malleable.

Or perhaps you've returned to your old idea

that the proletarians will arise.

Put it out of your mind.

They are helpless animals.

Humanity is the body.

I don't care. In the end, they'll beat you.

Sooner or later, they'll tear you to pieces.

On what evidence?

Goldstein's book.

I wrote it.

Or, at least, I collaborated in writing it.

No book is individually produced,

as you know.

I just believe it.

I know you'll fail.

Something in this world...

some spirit you will never overcome...

What is it, this principle?

I don't know.

The spirit of man.

And do you consider yourself a man?

Yes.

If you are a man, you're the last man.

Your kind is extinct.

We are the inheritors.

Do you understand that you are alone?

You are outside history.

You unexist.

Get up.

Come here.

Look at you.

You're rotting away.

That is the last man.

If you are human, that is humanity.

It will not last forever.

You can escape from it

whenever you choose.

Everything depends on you.

You did it.

You reduced me to this.

No, Winston.

You reduced yourself to it.

When will you shoot me?

Might take a long time.

But don't give up hope.

Everyone is cured sooner or later.

And in the end...

we shall shoot you.

The law of gravity is nonsense.

No such law exists.

If I think I float...

and you think I float...

then it happens.

I love you.

You have the strength, Winston.

You have the whole Party.

You are the Party.

You're one of us, one of the chosen.

I love you.

I love you, too.

Julia, my love.

Get up.

Stand up straighter.

Look me in the face.

Tell me, Winston, and remember, no lies.

What are your true feelings

towards Big Brother?

-I hate him.

-You must love him.

It's not enough to obey him.

You must love him.

Room 101.

You asked me once, Winston,

what was in Room 101.

I told you that you knew, already.

Everyone knows.

The thing that is in Room 101...

is the worst thing in the world.

It goes beyond fear of pain or death.

It is unendurable,

and it varies from individual to individual.

It may be burial alive or castration...

or many other things.

In your case, it is rats.

No.

Please. What do you want me to do?

You will do what is required of you.

What? What is it?

How can I do it if I don't know what it is?

In the proletarian areas,

they will attack a baby...

and within five minutes, strip it to the bone.

They also attack the sick and dying.

They show astonishing intelligence

in knowing when a human being is helpless.

Please.

The mask fits over your head,

leaving no exit.

I press the first lever...

and the rats move into

the front compartment.

I press the second,

and the door of the cage will slide up.

These starving brutes

will shoot at you like bullets.

Have you ever seen a rat

leap through the air?

They will leap onto your face

and bore straight into it.

Sometimes they attack the eyes first.

Sometimes they burrow through the cheeks

and devour the tongue.

Tell me. What do you want?

No, please.

I love you.

Do it to her! Do it to Julia!

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