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Rereading Nineteen Eighty Four – Part III Chap 2 (14)

As the torture continues O’Brien pontificates how heretics are dealt with:

”  We burn all evil and all illusion out of him; we bring him over to our side, not in appearance, but genuinely, heart and soul. We make him one of ourselves before we kill him.”

“… we make the brain perfect before we blow it out. The command of the old despotisms was “Thou shalt not”. The command of the totalitarians was “Thou shalt”. Our command is “Thou art”. No one whom we bring to this place ever stands… against us. ..Even those three miserable traitors in whose innocence you once believed — Jones, Aaronson, and Rutherford — in the end we broke them down. “

O’Brien brags how he tortured them.

 ” By the time we had finished …they were only the shells of men. There was nothing left in them except sorrow for what they had done, and love of Big Brother. It was touching to see how they loved him. They begged to be shot quickly, so that they could die while their minds were still clean.’

Winston watched O’Brien realising  he was not pretending, he believed every word he said.

In an odd way, he impressed Winston.

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What do you think?

Written by jaylar

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