jaylar
Winston followed Julia, having decided he would accompany her as far as the Tube station. Then the process of trailing along in the cold seemed pointless and unbearable.
Winston was overwhelmed by a desire not so much to get away from Julia as to get back to the Chestnut Tree Cafe, which had never seemed so attractive as at this moment.
He had a nostalgic vision of his corner table, with the newspaper and the chessboard and the ever flowing gin.
Above all, it would be warm in there.
Not altogether by accident, he allowed himself to become separated from Julia by a small knot of people, made a half-hearted attempt to catch up, then slowed, turned, and made off in the opposite direction.
When he had gone fifty metres he looked back.
——
What is so significant in this portion is how the separate minds of Winston operated. There was the ‘real’ Winston who would want to accompany Julia, then there was the mind altered Winston, slave of the Party, who saw the Cafe as some kind of haven.
To sit alone and ignored and kept semi-drunk with a a gin he didn’t even like, was now more desirable than the woman he had once loved.
