Nineteen Eighty-Four

Chapter3

CHAPTER 3: The hate rose to it’s c****x. The voice of Goldstein had become an actual sheep’s bleat, and for an instant the face changed into that of a sheep. Then the sheep-face melted into the figure of a Eurasian soldier who seemed to be advancing, huge and terrible his submachine gun roaring and seeming to spring out of the surface of the screen, so that some of the people in the front flow actually flinched backwards in the seats. But in the same moment, drawing a deep sigh of relief from everybody, the hostile figure melted into the face of big- brother, black-haired, blackmoustachio’d full of power mysterious, and so vast that it almost filled up the screen. Nobody heard what big brother was saying. It was merely a few words of encouragement, a sort of words that are uttered in the din of battle, not distinguishable individually but restoring confidence by the fact of being spoken. Then the face of big brother faded away again, and instead the three slogans stood out bold capitals:

WAR IS PEACE

FREEDOM IS SLAVERY

IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

But the face of big brother seemed to persist for several seconds on the screen, as though the impact it had made on everyone’s eyeballs was too vivid to wear off immediately. The little sandy-haired woman had flung herself forward over the back of the chair in front of her. With a tremulous murmur that sounded like ‘my saviour!’ she extended her arms towards the screen. Then she buried her face in her hands. It was apparent that she was uttering a prayer.

At this moment the entire group of people broke into a deep, slow, rhythmical chant of ‘ B-B!…B-B!’- over and over again, very slowly with a long pause between the first ‘B’ and the second – a heavy murmurous sound, somehow curiously savage, in the background of which one seemed to hear a stamp of naked feet and the throbbing of tom-toms. For perhaps as much as thirty seconds they kept it up. It was a refrain that was often heard in moments of overwhelming emotions. Partly it was sort of hymn to the wisdom and the majesty of big brother. But still more it was an act of self hypnosis, a deliberate drowning of consciousness by means of rhythmic noise. Winston entrails seemed to grow cold. In the two minutes hate he could not help sharing in the general delirium, but this sub-human chanting of ‘B-B!...B-B!’ always filled him with horror. Of course he chanted with the rest: it was impossible to do otherwise. To dissemble your feelings, to control your face, to do what everyone’s was doing, was instinctive reaction. But there was space of couple of seconds during which the expression of his eyes might conceivably have betrayed him. And it was exactly at this moment that the significant thing happened -if, indeed, it did happen.

Momentarily he caught O’Brien’s eyes. O’Brien had stood up. He had taken off his spectacles and was in the act of resettling them on his noise with his characteristic gesture. But there was a fraction of seconds when their eyes met, and for as long as it took to happen Winston knew- yes, he KNEW!- that O’Brien was thinking the same thing as himself. An unmistakable message had passed. It was as though their two minds had opened and the thoughts were flowing from one into the other through their eyes. I am with you; O’Brien seemed to be saying to him. I know precisely what you are feeling. I know all about your contempt, your hatred, your disgust. But don’t worry, I am on your side!’ and then the flash of intelligence was gone, and O’Brien’s face was as inscrutable as everybody else’s.

That was all, and he was ready uncertain whether it had happened. Such incidents never had any sequel. All that they did was to keep alive in him the belief, or hope, that others besides himself were the enemies of the party. Perhaps the rumours of vast underground conspiracies were true after all- perhaps the brotherhood really existed! It was impossible, in spite if endless arrests and confession and executions,to be sure that brotherhood was not simply a myth. Some days he believed in it, some days not. There was no evidence, only fleeting glimpses that might mean anything or nothing: snatched of overheard conversation, faint scribbles on lavatory walls-once, even, when two strangers, a small movement of the hand which had looked as though it might be a signal of recognition. It was all guesswork: very likely he had imagined everything. He had gone back to his cubicle without looking at O’Brien again. The idea of following up their momentary contact hardly crossed his mind. It would have been inconceivably dangerous even if he had known how to set about how doing it. For a second, two seconds, they had exchanged an equivocal glance, and that was the end of the story. But even that was memorable event, in the locked loneliness in which one had to live.

Winston roused himself and sat up straighter. He let out a belch. The gin was rising from his stomach. His eyes re-focused on the page. He discovered that while he sat helplessly musing he had also been writing, as though by automatic action. And it was no longer the same cramped, awkward handwriting as before. His pen had slid voluptuously over the smooth paper, printing large neat capitals- DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER over and over again, filling half a page.

He could not help feeling a twinge of panic. It was absurd, since the writing of those particular words was not more dangerous than the initial act of opening the diary, but for a moment he was tempted to tear out the spoiled pages and abandon the enterprise altogether.

He did not do so, however, because he knew that it was useless. Whether he wrote DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER, or whether he refrained from writing it, made no difference. Whether he went on with the diary, or whether he did not go on with it, made no difference. The thought police would get him just the same. He have committed- wound still had committed, even if he had never set pen to paper- the essential crime that contained all others in itself. Thoughtcrime, they called it. Thoughtcrime was not a thing that could be concealed forever. You might dodge successful for a while, even for years, but sooner or later they were bound to get you.

It was always at night- the arrest invariably happened at night. The sudden jerk out of sleep, the rough hand shaking your shoulder, the light glaring in your eyes, the ring of hard faces round the bed. In the vast majority of cases there was no trial, no report of the arrest. People simply disappeared, always during the night. Your name was removed from the registers, every record of everything you had ever done was wiped out,with one-time existence was denied and then forgotten. You were abolished, annihilated: VAPORIZED was the usual word.

For a moment that he was seized by a kind of Hysteria. He begun writing in a hurried untidy scrawl: they’ll shoot me I don’t care they’ll shoot me in the back of the neck I don’t care down with big brother they always shoot you in the back of the neck I do t care down with big brother.

He sat down in his chair, slightly ashamed of himself, and laid down the pen. The next moment he started violently. There was a knocking at the door.

Already! He sat as still as a mouse, in the futile hope that whoever it was might go away after a single attempt. But no, the knocking was repeated. The worst thing of all would be to delay. His heart was thumping like a drum, but his face,from long habit, was probably expressionless. He got up and moved heavily towa

rds the door.