Saturday, March 28, 2015

In George Orwell's 1984, did O'Brien have any other intention apart from gaining Winston's trust by giving him "The Book"?

When he meets Winston Smith O'Brien obliquely refers to a
member of the Outer Party--the philologist Syme--now officially an unperson. This small
act of unorthodoxy emboldens Winston to visit O'Brien at his luxurious apartment to pick
up a newer edition of the Newspeak Dictionary. Accompanied there by Julia O'Brien
reaveals that he is a member of the shadowy Brotherhood, the purpose of which is to
overthrow the Party at some ideterminate future date; to the co-conspirators O'Brien
gives "The Book"--both an explanation of 1984's totalitarian society and a manifesto of
liberation from it. Of course, the whole plan is a ruse to flush out a disloyal member
of the Party. But is that the sole reason O'Brien has for giving Winston "The
Book"? From the beginning to the end of the novel Winston depicts the Party as a mystery
wrapped in an enigma, doing what it does for its own inscrutable reasons in the cause of
doublethink. And O'Brien personifies this. He is a fearsome believer in the gospel of
power for its own sake and at the same time a kindly grandfather, a symbol of Big
Brother, deeply concerned about the sanity of his favoured patient, Winston. After his
arrest, when Winston asks if the Party had also captured him, O'Brien replies that "they
got me long ago". This mysterious assertion seems to imply that the strategem of "The
Book" is not simply to capture Winston, the thought criminal, but to 'cure' him of his
insane attachment to a reality outside the Party's
control.           

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