Julia

by Sandra Newman

If you hated the enemy, you could be loved. People smiled dopily at each other, and some eyes welled with tears. They had had a good Hate.

“You are afraid,” O’Brien said. “You are thinking I know every secret you have sought to hide, every disloyal thought, every treasonous speech. You are thinking I know you are a sex criminal, that you trade in black-market goods, that you collude at the treason of others. You are thinking you must be killed for these crimes.”

“Only hate is good. That is the great revelation of Big Brother Thought. Perhaps future human beings will evolve some still higher faculty, purer and more ruthless. For now, this is the greatest of what is human: to hate and to be led by hate.”

Under the spreading chestnut tree I sold you and you sold me Oh, how cheap we proved to be Under the spreading chestnut tree

Twenty-seven years it had taken her to learn what kind of smile was hidden behind the black moustache. But it was all right, everything was all right. She had won the victory over herself at last. She hated Big Brother.

All was false. It was known to be false, but everyone lied about the lies, until no one knew where the lies began and ended.

She didn’t have the freedom to think of what was right. She must do what was safe. It was as Ampleforth had said: one had no choice, one must only live through it as if one had.