1984, Book 3, Chapter 2

That was doublethink.

Over to his left Winston saw the man
in the white coat break an ampoule and draw back the plunger of a syringe.

At this moment, which power is Oceania at war with?’

The grip of his limbs tightened again, but
the pain had ebbed away and the trembling had stopped, leaving him merely
weak and cold.

Will you understand, Winston, that no one whom
we bring to this place ever leaves our hands uncured?

There
had been times when consciousness, even the sort of consciousness that one
has in sleep, had stopped dead and started again after a blank interval.

He remembered a cell
with a plank bed, a sort of shelf sticking out from the wall, and a tin washbasin,
and meals of hot soup and bread and sometimes coffee.

He was strapped into a chair surrounded by dials, under dazzling lights.

He resettled his spectacles thoughtfully,
and took a pace or two up and down.

That is the fact
that you have got to relearn, Winston.

The war was against
Eurasia.

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

He knew, or he could
imagine, the arguments which proved his own nonexistence; but they were nonsense,
they were only a play on words.

At the other side of him
stood a man in a white coat, holding a hypodermic syringe.

All her rebelliousness, her deceit, her folly, her
149
dirty-mindedness — everything has been burned out of her.

Some dreadful thing
which had lain embedded in the future had somehow been skipped over and had
not happened.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

They slapped his face, wrung his ears. pulled his hair, made him
stand on one leg, refused him leave to urinate, shone glaring lights in his face
until his eyes ran with water; but the aim of this was simply to humiliate him
and destroy his power of arguing and reasoning.

It was
impossible to move so much as a centimetre in any direction.

He was rolling down a mighty corridor, a kilometre wide, full of glorious,
golden light, roaring with laughter and shouting out confessions at the top of
his voice.

His questioners now were not ruffians in black uniforms but Party
intellectuals, little rotund men with quick movements and flashing spectacles,
who worked on him in relays over periods which lasted — he thought, he could
not be sure — ten or twelve hours at a stretch.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

The fingers stood up before his eyes
like pillars, enormous, blurry, and seeming to vibrate, but unmistakably four.

You believe that reality is something objective,
external, existing in its own right.

You believed that three men, three one-time Party members named
Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford men who were executed for treachery and
sabotage after making the fullest possible confession — were not guilty of the
142
crimes they were charged with.

Does the past exist concretely, in space?

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

He was rolling down a mighty corridor, a kilometre wide, full of glorious,
golden light, roaring with laughter and shouting out confessions at the top of
his voice.

Naturally all the glory belonged
146
to the victim and all the shame to the Inquisitor who burned him.

O’Brien held up his left hand, its back towards Winston, with the thumb
hidden and the four fingers extended.

The pain died down again.

There were times when it went on and on until the cruel, wicked, unforgivable
thing seemed to him not that the guards continued to beat him but that he
could not force hirnself into losing consciousness.

He felt very cold, he was shaking uncontrollably, his
teeth were chattering, the tears were rolling down his cheeks.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

All her rebelliousness, her deceit, her folly, her
149
dirty-mindedness — everything has been burned out of her.

We convert him, we
capture his inner mind, we reshape him.

O’Brien was looking down at him speculatively.

You have a vivid mental picture of the vertebrae snapping apart and the spinal
fluid dripping out of them.

He remembered a cell
with a plank bed, a sort of shelf sticking out from the wall, and a tin washbasin,
and meals of hot soup and bread and sometimes coffee.

Suddenly
he floated out of his seat, dived into the eyes, and was swallowed up.

More than ever he had the
air of a teacher taking pains with a wayward but promising child.

He did not know whether the thing was really happening, or whether
the effect was electrically produced; but his body was being wrenched out of
shape, the joints were being slowly torn apart.

Because the Inquisition killed
its enemies in the open, and killed them while they were still unrepentant: in
fact, it killed them because they were unrepentant.

It needs an act of self-destruction, an
effort of the will.

Most of the time they screamed abuse at him and threatened at every
hesitation to deliver him over to the guards again; but sometimes they would
suddenly change their tune, call him comrade, appeal to him in the name of
Ingsoc and Big Brother, and ask him sorrowfully whether even now he had not
enough loyalty to the Party left to make him wish to undo the evil he had done.

A terrific
painless blow had flattened him out.

When his nerves were in rags after hours of questioning, even this appeal could
reduce him to snivelling tears.

Over to his left Winston saw the man
in the white coat break an ampoule and draw back the plunger of a syringe.

Even the back of his head
was gripped in some manner.

His body was held down at every essential point.

He had a feeling of deadly
helplessness.

’Do you remember,’ he went on, ’ writing in your diary, ”Freedom is the
freedom to say that two plus two make four”?’

’You are a slow learner, Winston,’ said O’Brien gently.

There were times when his
nerve so forsook him that he began shouting for mercy even before the beating
began, when the mere sight of a fist drawn back for a blow was enough to make
him pour forth a confession of real and imaginary crimes.

I saw them gradually worn down, whimpering,
147
grovelling, weeping — and in the end it was not with pain or fear, only with
penitence.

And once — Winston could not remember whether it was
in drugged sleep, or in normal sleep, or even in a moment of wakefulness — a
voice murmured in his ear: ’Don’t worry, Winston; you are in my keeping.

A terrific
painless blow had flattened him out.

He confessed that he was a religious believer, an admirer of capitalism,
and a sexual pervert.

Even the victim of the Russian purges
could carry rebellion locked up in his skull as he walked down the passage
waiting for the bullet.

And even
if we chose to let you live out the natural term of your life, still you would never
escape from us.

Although the pain had brought
the sweat out on his forehead, the worst of all was the fear that his backbone
was about to snap.

Did I not tell you just now that we are different
from the persecutors of the past?

If we choose to set you free when we
have finished with you, and if you live to be ninety years old, still you will never
learn whether the answer to that question is Yes or No. As long as you live it
will be an unsolved riddle in your mind.’

In the end the nagging voices broke him down
more completely than the boots and fists of the guards.

He paused for a few moments, as though to allow what he had been saying
to sink in.

Later he
was to realize that all that then happened was merely a preliminary, a routine
interrogation to which nearly all prisoners were subjected.

He
felt certain that O’Brien was about to twist the dial out of sheer wantonness.

His face looked enormous because of its
nearness, and hideously ugly because it was seen from below.

In the end the nagging voices broke him down
more completely than the boots and fists of the guards.

They stood out in his mind
140
disconnectedly, like pictures with blackness all round them.

Winston drew in his breath.

Immediately-unreservedly.

They wore them down
by torture and solitude until they were despicable, cringing wretches, confessing
whatever was put into their mouths, covering themselves with abuse, accusing
and sheltering behind one another, whimpering for mercy.

O’Brien
laid a hand reassuringly, almost kindly, on his.

’Room 101,’ said the officer.

You will be lifted
clean out from the stream of history.

He remembered a cell
with a plank bed, a sort of shelf sticking out from the wall, and a tin washbasin,
and meals of hot soup and bread and sometimes coffee.

Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only gradually.

He was starting up from the plank bed in the half-certainty that he had
heard O’Brien’s voice.

And once — Winston could not remember whether it was
in drugged sleep, or in normal sleep, or even in a moment of wakefulness — a
voice murmured in his ear: ’Don’t worry, Winston; you are in my keeping.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

At the other side of him
stood a man in a white coat, holding a hypodermic syringe.

It was a perfect
conversion, a textbook case.’

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

Unseen, the frail slip of paper was whirling away on
the current of warm air; it was vanishing in a flash of flame.

He was confessing everything, even the things he had succeeded in
holding back under the torture.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

There were other
times when he started out with the resolve of confessing nothing, when every
word had to be forced out of him between gasps of pain, and there were times
when he feebly tried to compromise, when he said to himself: ’I will confess, but
not yet.

Even now, I am well aware, you are clinging to your
disease under the impression that it is a virtue.

It is written down.’

His mind shrivelled
as he thought of the unanswerable, mad arguments with which O’Brien would
demolish him.

He had the impression of swimming up into this room from some quite different
world, a sort of underwater world far beneath it.

His mind shrivelled
as he thought of the unanswerable, mad arguments with which O’Brien would
demolish him.

Sometimes it was fists, sometimes it was
truncheons, sometimes it was steel rods, sometimes it was boots.

You believed that three men, three one-time Party members named
Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford men who were executed for treachery and
sabotage after making the fullest possible confession — were not guilty of the
142
crimes they were charged with.

If he could
have moved he would have stretched out a hand and laid it on O’Brien arm.

It was a frightening pain, because he could not see what
was happening, and he had the feeling that some mortal injury was being done
to him.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

They stood out in his mind
140
disconnectedly, like pictures with blackness all round them.

You also believe that the nature of reality
is self-evident.

The needle of the dial had shot up to
fifty-five.

You believe that reality is something objective,
external, existing in its own right.

If you tell me any lies, or attempt to prevaricate in any way,
or even fall below your usual level of intelligence, you will cry out with pain,
instantly.

You have a vivid mental picture of the vertebrae snapping apart and the spinal
fluid dripping out of them.

O’Brien left this unanswered.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

When he spoke it was in an easy, conversational tone.

Near at hand some kind of instrument was
ticking slowly and regularly.

’Ashes,’ he said.

He made
a desperate, agonizing effort to wrench the top half of his body free.

In the old days the heretic walked to the stake still a heretic,
proclaiming his heresy, exulting in it.

They stood out in his mind
140
disconnectedly, like pictures with blackness all round them.

”Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls
the past,” repeated Winston obediently.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

Behind his screwed-up eyelids a forest of
fingers seemed to be moving in a sort of dance, weaving in and out, disappearing
behind one another and reappearing again.

Perhaps the needle was eighty — ninety.

He answered drily:
’You know what is in Room 101, Winston.

Will you understand, Winston, that no one whom
we bring to this place ever leaves our hands uncured?

His face looked enormous because of its
nearness, and hideously ugly because it was seen from below.

Later, in
the twentieth century, there were the totalitarians, as they were called.

The door clanged open.

The grip of his limbs tightened again, but
the pain had ebbed away and the trembling had stopped, leaving him merely
weak and cold.

Unseen, the frail slip of paper was whirling away on
the current of warm air; it was vanishing in a flash of flame.

Sometimes it was fists, sometimes it was
truncheons, sometimes it was steel rods, sometimes it was boots.

That had lasted for four years.

Never again will you be capable of ordinary human feeling.

Even his spectacles seemed to wear an ironical
gleam.

He had the impression of swimming up into this room from some quite different
world, a sort of underwater world far beneath it.

The fingers stood up before his eyes
like pillars, enormous, blurry, and seeming to vibrate, but unmistakably four.

It was he
who decided when Winston should scream with pain, when he should have a
respite, when he should be fed, when he should sleep, when the drugs should
be pumped into his arm.

Most of the time they screamed abuse at him and threatened at every
hesitation to deliver him over to the guards again; but sometimes they would
suddenly change their tune, call him comrade, appeal to him in the name of
Ingsoc and Big Brother, and ask him sorrowfully whether even now he had not
enough loyalty to the Party left to make him wish to undo the evil he had done.

With that first blow on the elbow the nightmare had started.

You have a vivid mental picture of the vertebrae snapping apart and the spinal
fluid dripping out of them.

There were other
times when he started out with the resolve of confessing nothing, when every
word had to be forced out of him between gasps of pain, and there were times
when he feebly tried to compromise, when he said to himself: ’I will confess, but
not yet.

The fingers stood up before his eyes
like pillars, enormous, blurry, and seeming to vibrate, but unmistakably four.

He was the tormentor, he was the protector, he was the inquisitor,
he was the friend.

O’Brien had tortured him to the edge of lunacy, and in a little
while, it was certain, he would send him to his death.

Always there were five or six men in
black uniforms at him simultaneously.

There
had been times when consciousness, even the sort of consciousness that one
has in sleep, had stopped dead and started again after a blank interval.

It was a frightening pain, because he could not see what
was happening, and he had the feeling that some mortal injury was being done
to him.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

You are a
stain that must be wiped out.

No such piece of paper ever existed.

His face, seen from below, looked coarse and worn, with pouches
under the eyes and tired lines from nose to chin.

When finally you surrender to us,
it must be of your own free will.

At sight of the heavy,
lined face, so ugly and so intelligent, his heart seemed to turn over.

You will be annihilated in the past as well as in the
future.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

You believed that three men, three one-time Party members named
Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford men who were executed for treachery and
sabotage after making the fullest possible confession — were not guilty of the
142
crimes they were charged with.

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

At this moment, however, O’Brien turned away.

Behind his screwed-up eyelids a forest of
fingers seemed to be moving in a sort of dance, weaving in and out, disappearing
behind one another and reappearing again.

There were times when his
nerve so forsook him that he began shouting for mercy even before the beating
began, when the mere sight of a fist drawn back for a blow was enough to make
him pour forth a confession of real and imaginary crimes.

He was strapped into a chair surrounded by dials, under dazzling lights.

Most of the time they screamed abuse at him and threatened at every
hesitation to deliver him over to the guards again; but sometimes they would
suddenly change their tune, call him comrade, appeal to him in the name of
Ingsoc and Big Brother, and ask him sorrowfully whether even now he had not
enough loyalty to the Party left to make him wish to undo the evil he had done.

This time the pain was only slightly eased.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

”Who controls the present controls the past,” said O’Brien, nodding his
head with slow approval.

He was older than Winston
had thought him; he was perhaps forty-eight or fifty.

For
seven years I have watched over you.

Two soft pads, which felt slightly moist, clamped themselves against Winston’s
temples.

And above all we do not allow
the dead to rise up against us.

Most of the time they screamed abuse at him and threatened at every
hesitation to deliver him over to the guards again; but sometimes they would
suddenly change their tune, call him comrade, appeal to him in the name of
Ingsoc and Big Brother, and ask him sorrowfully whether even now he had not
enough loyalty to the Party left to make him wish to undo the evil he had done.

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

O’Brien held up his left hand, its back towards Winston, with the thumb
hidden and the four fingers extended.

’There is a Party slogan dealing with the control of the past,’ he said.

How many times he had been beaten, how long the beatings
had continued, he could not remember.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

At the other side of him
stood a man in a white coat, holding a hypodermic syringe.

The waxed-faced officer marched in, followed
by two guards.

In the
first place, because the confessions that they had made were obviously extorted
and untrue.

A terrific
painless blow had flattened him out.

There were times when his
nerve so forsook him that he began shouting for mercy even before the beating
began, when the mere sight of a fist drawn back for a blow was enough to make
him pour forth a confession of real and imaginary crimes.

In the end the nagging voices broke him down
more completely than the boots and fists of the guards.

But there had been a moment — he did not know how
long, thirty seconds, perhaps—of luminous certainty, when each new suggestion
of O’Brien’s had filled up a patch of emptiness and become absolute truth, and
when two and two could have been three as easily as five, if that were what was
needed.

Will you please remember, throughout our conversation,
that I have it in my power to inflict pain on you at any moment and to whatever
degree I choose?

The
pain lessened again.

Some dreadful thing
which had lain embedded in the future had somehow been skipped over and had
not happened.

His large ugly face came nearer, with the eyes a little narrowed.

They slapped his face, wrung his ears. pulled his hair, made him
stand on one leg, refused him leave to urinate, shone glaring lights in his face
until his eyes ran with water; but the aim of this was simply to humiliate him
and destroy his power of arguing and reasoning.

Behind his screwed-up eyelids a forest of
fingers seemed to be moving in a sort of dance, weaving in and out, disappearing
behind one another and reappearing again.

The air tore into
his lungs and issued again in deep groans which even by clenching his teeth he
could not stop.

For the moment
he had even forgotten the dial.

Sometimes he was
beaten till he could hardly stand, then flung like a sack of potatoes on to the
stone floor of a cell, left to recuperate for a few hours, and then taken out and
beaten again.

The needle must be at seventy,
seventy-five.

He confessed that he was a religious believer, an admirer of capitalism,
and a sexual pervert.

Abruptly he was sitting up with O’Brien’s arm round his shoulders.

And if so, then already he would have forgotten his
denial of remembering it, and forgotten the act of forgetting.

The needle must be at seventy,
seventy-five.

They wore them down
by torture and solitude until they were despicable, cringing wretches, confessing
whatever was put into their mouths, covering themselves with abuse, accusing
and sheltering behind one another, whimpering for mercy.

’You can see that the numbers on this dial
run up to a hundred.

There
had been times when consciousness, even the sort of consciousness that one
has in sleep, had stopped dead and started again after a blank interval.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

Behind his screwed-up eyelids a forest of
fingers seemed to be moving in a sort of dance, weaving in and out, disappearing
behind one another and reappearing again.

Once again, why was it?

At sight of the heavy,
lined face, so ugly and so intelligent, his heart seemed to turn over.

Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only gradually.

There were times when his
nerve so forsook him that he began shouting for mercy even before the beating
began, when the mere sight of a fist drawn back for a blow was enough to make
him pour forth a confession of real and imaginary crimes.

Sometimes it was fists, sometimes it was
truncheons, sometimes it was steel rods, sometimes it was boots.

He confessed that he was a religious believer, an admirer of capitalism,
and a sexual pervert.

Behind his screwed-up eyelids a forest of
fingers seemed to be moving in a sort of dance, weaving in and out, disappearing
behind one another and reappearing again.

He was rolling down a mighty corridor, a kilometre wide, full of glorious,
golden light, roaring with laughter and shouting out confessions at the top of
his voice.

When his nerves were in rags after hours of questioning, even this appeal could
reduce him to snivelling tears.

How many times he had been beaten, how long the beatings
had continued, he could not remember.

A needle jerked into Winston’s arm.

I must hold out till the pain becomes unbearable.

You have not controlled mine!’

He felt very cold, he was shaking uncontrollably, his
teeth were chattering, the tears were rolling down his cheeks.

Then everything
was normal again, and the old fear, the hatred, and the bewilderment came
crowding back again.

The bonds that had held his
body down were loosened.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

There
were the German Nazis and the Russian Communists.

How many times he had been beaten, how long the beatings
had continued, he could not remember.

He opened his eyes and looked up gratefully at O’Brien.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

But he had seen it, unquestionably he had seen it!

There was a long
range of crimes — espionage, sabotage, and the like — to which everyone had
to confess as a matter of course.

His voice had grown almost dreamy.

The heavy, stern
face and the four fingers filled his vision.

You will kill me if you do that again.

How long he had been down
there he did not know.

These other questioners saw
to it that he was in constant slight pain, but it was not chiefly pain that they
relied on.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

O’Brien
was standing at his side, looking down at him intently.

There were other
times when he started out with the resolve of confessing nothing, when every
word had to be forced out of him between gasps of pain, and there were times
when he feebly tried to compromise, when he said to himself: ’I will confess, but
not yet.

Later, in
the twentieth century, there were the totalitarians, as they were called.

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

His face, seen from below, looked coarse and worn, with pouches
under the eyes and tired lines from nose to chin.

You believed that you had seen unmistakable
documentary evidence proving that their confessions were false.

Without any warning except a slight movement of O’Brien’s hand, a wave of
141
pain flooded his body.

At the other side of him
stood a man in a white coat, holding a hypodermic syringe.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

He became simply a
mouth that uttered, a hand that signed, whatever was demanded of him.

There
had been times when consciousness, even the sort of consciousness that one
has in sleep, had stopped dead and started again after a blank interval.

Unseen, the frail slip of paper was whirling away on
the current of warm air; it was vanishing in a flash of flame.

The man in the white
coat bent down and looked closely into Winston’s eyes, felt his pulse, laid an
ear against his chest, tapped here and there, then he nodded to O’Brien.

’I think I exist,’ he said wearily.

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

Sometimes he was
beaten till he could hardly stand, then flung like a sack of potatoes on to the
stone floor of a cell, left to recuperate for a few hours, and then taken out and
beaten again.

For every heretic it burned at the stake,
thousands of others rose up.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

There was a long
range of crimes — espionage, sabotage, and the like — to which everyone had
to confess as a matter of course.

I took part
in their interrogation myself.

His questioners now were not ruffians in black uniforms but Party
intellectuals, little rotund men with quick movements and flashing spectacles,
who worked on him in relays over periods which lasted — he thought, he could
not be sure — ten or twelve hours at a stretch.

The Russians persecuted
heresy more cruelly than the Inquisition had done.

With that first blow on the elbow the nightmare had started.

It is intolerable
to us that an erroneous thought should exist anywhere in the world, however
secret and powerless it may be.

You have a vivid mental picture of the vertebrae snapping apart and the spinal
fluid dripping out of them.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

Light that seemed stronger than usual was falling on his face.

Light that seemed stronger than usual was falling on his face.

There were other
times when he started out with the resolve of confessing nothing, when every
word had to be forced out of him between gasps of pain, and there were times
when he feebly tried to compromise, when he said to himself: ’I will confess, but
not yet.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

You are a
stain that must be wiped out.

There were times when it went on and on until the cruel, wicked, unforgivable
thing seemed to him not that the guards continued to beat him but that he
could not force hirnself into losing consciousness.

They slapped his face, wrung his ears. pulled his hair, made him
stand on one leg, refused him leave to urinate, shone glaring lights in his face
until his eyes ran with water; but the aim of this was simply to humiliate him
and destroy his power of arguing and reasoning.

”Who controls the present controls the past,” said O’Brien, nodding his
head with slow approval.

He was rolling down a mighty corridor, a kilometre wide, full of glorious,
golden light, roaring with laughter and shouting out confessions at the top of
his voice.

Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only gradually.

For a moment
he clung to O’Brien like a baby, curiously comforted by the heavy arm round
his shoulders.

He remembered a cell
with a plank bed, a sort of shelf sticking out from the wall, and a tin washbasin,
and meals of hot soup and bread and sometimes coffee.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

It had faded but before O’Brien had dropped his hand; but though
he could not recapture it, he could remember it, as one remembers a vivid
experience at some period of one’s life when one was in effect a different person.

Some dreadful thing
which had lain embedded in the future had somehow been skipped over and had
not happened.

He is not pretending, thought Winston, he is not
a hypocrite, he believes every word he says.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

Light that seemed stronger than usual was falling on his face.

The pain died down again.

Since the moment when they arrested him he had not
seen darkness or daylight.

Innumerable fingers, like moving trees, were
still streaming past in either direction, crossing and recrossing.

At the thought the words burst out of him:
’What is in Room 101?’

With that first blow on the elbow the nightmare had started.

144
’How many fingers, Winston?’

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

’The truth, please, Winston.

At this moment, which power is Oceania at war with?’

Is there somewhere or
other a place, a world of solid objects, where the past is still happening?’

You believed that three men, three one-time Party members named
Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford men who were executed for treachery and
sabotage after making the fullest possible confession — were not guilty of the
142
crimes they were charged with.

145
’I don’t know.

When his nerves were in rags after hours of questioning, even this appeal could
reduce him to snivelling tears.

There were times when his
nerve so forsook him that he began shouting for mercy even before the beating
began, when the mere sight of a fist drawn back for a blow was enough to make
him pour forth a confession of real and imaginary crimes.

The beatings grew less frequent, and became mainly a threat, a horror to
which he could be sent back at any moment when his answers were unsatisfactory.

Two soft pads, which felt slightly moist, clamped themselves against Winston’s
temples.

That is the fact
that you have got to relearn, Winston.

Did I not tell you just now that we are different
from the persecutors of the past?

How long he had been down
there he did not know.

That is the fact
that you have got to relearn, Winston.

Although the pain had brought
the sweat out on his forehead, the worst of all was the fear that his backbone
was about to snap.

’Yes,’ said Winston.

There was a tramp of heavy boots
outside.

It was O’Brien who was directing everything.

An oblong slip of newspaper had appeared between O’Brien’s fingers.

There were times when his
nerve so forsook him that he began shouting for mercy even before the beating
began, when the mere sight of a fist drawn back for a blow was enough to make
him pour forth a confession of real and imaginary crimes.

In the
Middle Ages there was the Inquisitlon.

Almost in the same instant a blissful, healing
warmth spread all through his body.

Everything was all right, there was no more pain, the last detail
of his life was laid bare, understood, forgiven.

O’Brien
was standing at his side, looking down at him intently.

He opened his eyes and looked up gratefully at O’Brien.

Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only gradually.

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

I must hold out till the pain becomes unbearable.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

His face, seen from below, looked coarse and worn, with pouches
under the eyes and tired lines from nose to chin.

This time the pain was only slightly eased.

It was he
who decided when Winston should scream with pain, when he should have a
respite, when he should be fed, when he should sleep, when the drugs should
be pumped into his arm.

A needle slid into Winston’s arm.

He
had never loved him so deeply as at this moment, and not merely because he
had stopped the pain.

At the other side of him
stood a man in a white coat, holding a hypodermic syringe.

You have never cured yourself of it,
because you did not choose to.

There
were the German Nazis and the Russian Communists.

Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only gradually.

There were other
times when he started out with the resolve of confessing nothing, when every
word had to be forced out of him between gasps of pain, and there were times
when he feebly tried to compromise, when he said to himself: ’I will confess, but
not yet.

There
had been times when consciousness, even the sort of consciousness that one
has in sleep, had stopped dead and started again after a blank interval.

The beatings grew less frequent, and became mainly a threat, a horror to
which he could be sent back at any moment when his answers were unsatisfactory.

He set his teeth and breathed hard through his nose, trying
to keep silent as long as possible.

And they imagined that
they had learned from the mistakes of the past; they knew, at any rate, that
one must not make martyrs.

You believed that three men, three one-time Party members named
Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford men who were executed for treachery and
sabotage after making the fullest possible confession — were not guilty of the
142
crimes they were charged with.

I have seldom seen anyone come over to us so promptly.

O’Brien lifted the grating.

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

He remembered a cell
with a plank bed, a sort of shelf sticking out from the wall, and a tin washbasin,
and meals of hot soup and bread and sometimes coffee.

You will be lifted
clean out from the stream of history.

He was lying on something that felt like a camp bed, except that it was higher
off the ground and that he was fixed down in some way so that he could not
move.

If you tell me any lies, or attempt to prevaricate in any way,
or even fall below your usual level of intelligence, you will cry out with pain,
instantly.

A terrific
painless blow had flattened him out.

He confessed that for years he had been in personal touch with Goldstein and
had been a member of an underground organization which had included almost
every human being he had ever known.

There were other
times when he started out with the resolve of confessing nothing, when every
word had to be forced out of him between gasps of pain, and there were times
when he feebly tried to compromise, when he said to himself: ’I will confess, but
not yet.

He became simply a
mouth that uttered, a hand that signed, whatever was demanded of him.

Even the victim of the Russian purges
could carry rebellion locked up in his skull as he walked down the passage
waiting for the bullet.

At the other side of him
stood a man in a white coat, holding a hypodermic syringe.

He had the impression of swimming up into this room from some quite different
world, a sort of underwater world far beneath it.

They slapped his face, wrung his ears. pulled his hair, made him
stand on one leg, refused him leave to urinate, shone glaring lights in his face
until his eyes ran with water; but the aim of this was simply to humiliate him
and destroy his power of arguing and reasoning.

His questioners now were not ruffians in black uniforms but Party
intellectuals, little rotund men with quick movements and flashing spectacles,
who worked on him in relays over periods which lasted — he thought, he could
not be sure — ten or twelve hours at a stretch.

It was another copy of the photograph of Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford at
the party function in New York, which he had chanced upon eleven years ago
and promptly destroyed.

They slapped his face, wrung his ears. pulled his hair, made him
stand on one leg, refused him leave to urinate, shone glaring lights in his face
until his eyes ran with water; but the aim of this was simply to humiliate him
and destroy his power of arguing and reasoning.

There were times when it went on and on until the cruel, wicked, unforgivable
thing seemed to him not that the guards continued to beat him but that he
could not force hirnself into losing consciousness.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

He was bending over Winston.

Winston was aware
of some heavy piece of apparatus being pushed into place behind his head.

They stood out in his mind
140
disconnectedly, like pictures with blackness all round them.

Most of the time they screamed abuse at him and threatened at every
hesitation to deliver him over to the guards again; but sometimes they would
suddenly change their tune, call him comrade, appeal to him in the name of
Ingsoc and Big Brother, and ask him sorrowfully whether even now he had not
enough loyalty to the Party left to make him wish to undo the evil he had done.

He confessed that for years he had been in personal touch with Goldstein and
had been a member of an underground organization which had included almost
every human being he had ever known.

He was rolling down a mighty corridor, a kilometre wide, full of glorious,
golden light, roaring with laughter and shouting out confessions at the top of
his voice.

He resettled his spectacles thoughtfully,
and took a pace or two up and down.

Perhaps the needle was eighty — ninety.

He confessed that he had murdered his wife, although
he knew, and his questioners must have known, that his wife was still alive.

For
seven years I have watched over you.

And even
if we chose to let you live out the natural term of your life, still you would never
escape from us.

There were other
times when he started out with the resolve of confessing nothing, when every
word had to be forced out of him between gasps of pain, and there were times
when he feebly tried to compromise, when he said to himself: ’I will confess, but
not yet.

Unseen, the frail slip of paper was whirling away on
the current of warm air; it was vanishing in a flash of flame.

There
had been times when consciousness, even the sort of consciousness that one
has in sleep, had stopped dead and started again after a blank interval.

There
had been times when consciousness, even the sort of consciousness that one
has in sleep, had stopped dead and started again after a blank interval.

At sight of the heavy,
lined face, so ugly and so intelligent, his heart seemed to turn over.

He confessed that for years he had been in personal touch with Goldstein and
had been a member of an underground organization which had included almost
every human being he had ever known.

His face, seen from below, looked coarse and worn, with pouches
under the eyes and tired lines from nose to chin.

He confessed to the assassination of
eminent Party members, the distribution of seditious pamphlets, embezzlement
of public funds, sale of military secrets, sabotage of every kind.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

He had the impression of swimming up into this room from some quite different
world, a sort of underwater world far beneath it.

O’Brien smiled faintly.

He had the air of a doctor, a teacher, even a priest, anxious to
explain and persuade rather than to punish.

He had the impression of swimming up into this room from some quite different
world, a sort of underwater world far beneath it.

Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only gradually.

O’Brien smiled faintly.

There were other
times when he started out with the resolve of confessing nothing, when every
word had to be forced out of him between gasps of pain, and there were times
when he feebly tried to compromise, when he said to himself: ’I will confess, but
not yet.

And yet after only a
few years the same thing had happened over again.

Nothing will remain of you, not a name in a register, not
a memory in a living brain.

He remembered a cell
with a plank bed, a sort of shelf sticking out from the wall, and a tin washbasin,
and meals of hot soup and bread and sometimes coffee.

He confessed that for years he had been in personal touch with Goldstein and
had been a member of an underground organization which had included almost
every human being he had ever known.

O’Brien held up his left hand, its back towards Winston, with the thumb
hidden and the four fingers extended.

There were times when his
nerve so forsook him that he began shouting for mercy even before the beating
began, when the mere sight of a fist drawn back for a blow was enough to make
him pour forth a confession of real and imaginary crimes.

When he spoke his voice was gentle
and patient.

The needle went up to sixty.

Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only gradually.

He watched the heavy yet
graceful form strolling to and fro, in and out of the range of his vision.

Everything was all right, there was no more pain, the last detail
of his life was laid bare, understood, forgiven.

He became simply a
mouth that uttered, a hand that signed, whatever was demanded of him.

Will you please remember, throughout our conversation,
that I have it in my power to inflict pain on you at any moment and to whatever
degree I choose?

Then why bother to torture me? thought Winston, with a momentary bitterness.

That is what you are thinking, is it not, Winston?’

I enjoy talking to you.

For only an instant it was before his eyes, then it was
out of sight again.

There were other
times when he started out with the resolve of confessing nothing, when every
word had to be forced out of him between gasps of pain, and there were times
when he feebly tried to compromise, when he said to himself: ’I will confess, but
not yet.

He confessed
that he had been a spy in the pay of the Eastasian government as far back as
1968.

All through his interrogation, although he had never
seen him, he had had the feeling that O’Brien was at his elbow, just out of
sight.

For the moment
he had even forgotten the dial.

He was bending over Winston.

He had the impression of swimming up into this room from some quite different
world, a sort of underwater world far beneath it.

O’Brien
was standing at his side, looking down at him intently.

If you tell me any lies, or attempt to prevaricate in any way,
or even fall below your usual level of intelligence, you will cry out with pain,
instantly.

The fingers stood up before his eyes
like pillars, enormous, blurry, and seeming to vibrate, but unmistakably four.

Most of the time they screamed abuse at him and threatened at every
hesitation to deliver him over to the guards again; but sometimes they would
suddenly change their tune, call him comrade, appeal to him in the name of
Ingsoc and Big Brother, and ask him sorrowfully whether even now he had not
enough loyalty to the Party left to make him wish to undo the evil he had done.

He set his teeth and breathed hard through his nose, trying
to keep silent as long as possible.

He set his teeth and breathed hard through his nose, trying
to keep silent as long as possible.

Most of the time they screamed abuse at him and threatened at every
hesitation to deliver him over to the guards again; but sometimes they would
suddenly change their tune, call him comrade, appeal to him in the name of
Ingsoc and Big Brother, and ask him sorrowfully whether even now he had not
enough loyalty to the Party left to make him wish to undo the evil he had done.

He became simply a
mouth that uttered, a hand that signed, whatever was demanded of him.

Sometimes it was fists, sometimes it was
truncheons, sometimes it was steel rods, sometimes it was boots.

Most of the time they screamed abuse at him and threatened at every
hesitation to deliver him over to the guards again; but sometimes they would
suddenly change their tune, call him comrade, appeal to him in the name of
Ingsoc and Big Brother, and ask him sorrowfully whether even now he had not
enough loyalty to the Party left to make him wish to undo the evil he had done.

There
were the German Nazis and the Russian Communists.

He was older than Winston
had thought him; he was perhaps forty-eight or fifty.

’What have you done with Julia?’ said Winston.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

The air tore into
his lungs and issued again in deep groans which even by clenching his teeth he
could not stop.

I shall
save you, I shall make you perfect.’

He was not sure whether it was O’Brien’s
voice; but it was the same voice that had said to him, ’We shall meet in the
place where there is no darkness,’ in that other dream, seven years ago.

You pretended that you had seen a piece of
paper which proved them innocent.

O’Brien turned to Winston with a smile.

They wore them down
by torture and solitude until they were despicable, cringing wretches, confessing
whatever was put into their mouths, covering themselves with abuse, accusing
and sheltering behind one another, whimpering for mercy.

O’Brien checked his step as though Winston had uttered the thought
aloud.

For a moment
he clung to O’Brien like a baby, curiously comforted by the heavy arm round
his shoulders.

He did not know whether the thing was really happening, or whether
the effect was electrically produced; but his body was being wrenched out of
shape, the joints were being slowly torn apart.

His body was held down at every essential point.

The confession was a formality, though the
torture was real.

In the end the nagging voices broke him down
more completely than the boots and fists of the guards.

He was older than Winston
had thought him; he was perhaps forty-eight or fifty.

He opened his mouth to speak and then did
not speak.

He confessed that he had murdered his wife, although
he knew, and his questioners must have known, that his wife was still alive.

It had faded but before O’Brien had dropped his hand; but though
he could not recapture it, he could remember it, as one remembers a vivid
experience at some period of one’s life when one was in effect a different person.

He was almost flat on his back, and unable to move.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

He did not remember any ending to his interrogation.

Even now, I am well aware, you are clinging to your
disease under the impression that it is a virtue.

Although he had already been lying on his back when the thing happened, he
had a curious feeling that he had been knocked into that position.

Almost in the same instant a blissful, healing
warmth spread all through his body.

O’Brien lifted the grating.

His questioners now were not ruffians in black uniforms but Party
intellectuals, little rotund men with quick movements and flashing spectacles,
who worked on him in relays over periods which lasted — he thought, he could
not be sure — ten or twelve hours at a stretch.

Near at hand some kind of instrument was
ticking slowly and regularly.

Reality exists in the human mind, and
nowhere else.

There was a long
range of crimes — espionage, sabotage, and the like — to which everyone had
to confess as a matter of course.

Even the victim of the Russian purges
could carry rebellion locked up in his skull as he walked down the passage
waiting for the bullet.

He remembered a cell
with a plank bed, a sort of shelf sticking out from the wall, and a tin washbasin,
and meals of hot soup and bread and sometimes coffee.

There were
times when he rolled about the floor, as shameless as an animal, writhing his
body this way and that in an endless, hopeless effort to dodge the kicks, and
simply inviting more and yet more kicks, in his ribs, in his belly, on his elbows,
on his shins, in his groin, in his testicles, on the bone at the base of his spine.

He had the impression of swimming up into this room from some quite different
world, a sort of underwater world far beneath it.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

He confessed that for years he had been in personal touch with Goldstein and
had been a member of an underground organization which had included almost
every human being he had ever known.

Sometimes he was
beaten till he could hardly stand, then flung like a sack of potatoes on to the
stone floor of a cell, left to recuperate for a few hours, and then taken out and
beaten again.

He
had never loved him so deeply as at this moment, and not merely because he
had stopped the pain.

Fortunately it is curable.

He confessed that for years he had been in personal touch with Goldstein and
had been a member of an underground organization which had included almost
every human being he had ever known.

His breast rose and fell a little faster.

You believed that three men, three one-time Party members named
Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford men who were executed for treachery and
sabotage after making the fullest possible confession — were not guilty of the
142
crimes they were charged with.

O’Brien was looking down at him gravely and
rather sadly.

The word ended in a gasp of pain.

”Who controls the present controls the past,” said O’Brien, nodding his
head with slow approval.

How many times he had been beaten, how long the beatings
had continued, he could not remember.

It is written down.’

Perhaps that lunatic dislocation in the mind
could really happen: that was the thought that defeated him.

His voice had grown almost dreamy.

He confessed that he was a religious believer, an admirer of capitalism,
and a sexual pervert.

He became simply a
mouth that uttered, a hand that signed, whatever was demanded of him.

The heavy, stern
face and the four fingers filled his vision.

’I told you,’ said O’Brien, ’that if we met again it would be here.’

’This time it will not hurt,’ he said.

He confessed that he had murdered his wife, although
he knew, and his questioners must have known, that his wife was still alive.

Light that seemed stronger than usual was falling on his face.

’There is a Party slogan dealing with the control of the past,’ he said.

When his nerves were in rags after hours of questioning, even this appeal could
reduce him to snivelling tears.

He was not sure whether it was O’Brien’s
voice; but it was the same voice that had said to him, ’We shall meet in the
place where there is no darkness,’ in that other dream, seven years ago.

They slapped his face, wrung his ears. pulled his hair, made him
stand on one leg, refused him leave to urinate, shone glaring lights in his face
until his eyes ran with water; but the aim of this was simply to humiliate him
and destroy his power of arguing and reasoning.

Everyone is washed clean.

There was no idea that he had
ever had, or could have, that O’Brien had not long ago known, examined, and
rejected.

Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only gradually.

Winston could not intermittently
remember why the pain was happening.

Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only gradually.

You
invented it, and later you grew to believe in it.

He still had not
asked the question that had come into his mind the first.

Even after his eyes were open he took in his surroundings only gradually.

His
sole concern was to find out what they wanted him to confess, and then confess
it quickly, before the bullying started anew.

Near at hand some kind of instrument was
ticking slowly and regularly.

Abruptly he was sitting up with O’Brien’s arm round his shoulders.

The beatings grew less frequent, and became mainly a threat, a horror to
which he could be sent back at any moment when his answers were unsatisfactory.

We are not interested in
those stupid crimes that you have committed.

It was easier to confess everything and
implicate everybody.

Since the moment when they arrested him he had not
seen darkness or daylight.

He was not sure whether it was O’Brien’s
voice; but it was the same voice that had said to him, ’We shall meet in the
place where there is no darkness,’ in that other dream, seven years ago.

Later he
was to realize that all that then happened was merely a preliminary, a routine
interrogation to which nearly all prisoners were subjected.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.

And once — Winston could not remember whether it was
in drugged sleep, or in normal sleep, or even in a moment of wakefulness — a
voice murmured in his ear: ’Don’t worry, Winston; you are in my keeping.

He set his teeth and breathed hard through his nose, trying
to keep silent as long as possible.

He did not know whether the thing was really happening, or whether
the effect was electrically produced; but his body was being wrenched out of
shape, the joints were being slowly torn apart.

Although the pain had brought
the sweat out on his forehead, the worst of all was the fear that his backbone
was about to snap.

Behind his screwed-up eyelids a forest of
fingers seemed to be moving in a sort of dance, weaving in and out, disappearing
behind one another and reappearing again.

O’Brien was a person who
could be talked to.

Since the beginning of your
life, since the beginning of the Party, since the beginning of history, the war has
continued without a break, always the same war.

He was not sure whether it was O’Brien’s
voice; but it was the same voice that had said to him, ’We shall meet in the
place where there is no darkness,’ in that other dream, seven years ago.

They wore them down
by torture and solitude until they were despicable, cringing wretches, confessing
whatever was put into their mouths, covering themselves with abuse, accusing
and sheltering behind one another, whimpering for mercy.

Their real weapon was the
merciless questioning that went on and on, hour after hour, tripping him up,
laying traps for him, twisting everything that he said, convicting him at every
step of lies and self-contradiction until he began weeping as much from shame
as from nervous fatigue Sometimes he would weep half a dozen times in a single
session.

Everyone is washed clean.

O’Brien motioned with his head to the man in the white coat,
who had stood immobile throughout the proceedings.

He remembered a cell
with a plank bed, a sort of shelf sticking out from the wall, and a tin washbasin,
and meals of hot soup and bread and sometimes coffee.

He had shut his eyes this time.

There was a tramp of heavy boots
outside.

The needle must have risen again, but he did not look at it.

The eyes grew larger and more luminous.

He had a feeling of deadly
helplessness.

More than ever he had the
air of a teacher taking pains with a wayward but promising child.

Then everything
was normal again, and the old fear, the hatred, and the bewilderment came
crowding back again.

O’Brien had sat down beside the bed, so that his face was almost on a level
with Winston’s.

All her rebelliousness, her deceit, her folly, her
149
dirty-mindedness — everything has been burned out of her.

His face, seen from below, looked coarse and worn, with pouches
under the eyes and tired lines from nose to chin.

He remembered
a surly barber arriving to scrape his chin and crop his hair, and businesslike,
unsympathetic men in white coats feeling his pulse, tapping his reflexes, turning
up his eyelids, running harsh fingers over him in search for broken bones, and
shooting needles into his arm to make him sleep.