1984 (3,2) O'Brien's Intimacy

Winston has been given a shot to ease him out of his pain in the middle of his interrogation session, and this gives him an opportunity to appreciate an almost homoerotic attraction to his torturer.

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He opened his eyes and looked up gratefully at O’Brien. At sight of the heavy, lined face, so ugly and so intelligent, his heart seemed to turn over. If he could have moved he would have stretched out a hand and laid it on O’Brien’s arm. He had never loved him so deeply as at this moment, and not merely because he had stopped the pain. The old feeling, that at bottom it did not matter whether O’Brien was a friend or an enemy, had come back. O’Brien was a person who could be talked to. Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood. O’Brien had tortured him to the edge of lunacy, and in a little while, it was certain, he would send him to his death. It made no difference. In some sense that went deeper than friendship, they were intimates …

[A little later, during the course of this interrogation, Winston will express his awe over O’Brien’s superiority thus.]

There was no idea that he had ever had, or could have, that O’Brien had not long ago known, examined, and rejected. His mind contained Winston’s mind.

-- “1984” by George Orwell

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Quote of the Day

I'm tired of playing this game called life.

-- Ana's Cutter

Depression is like drowning, but not being able to die.

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