Krayden's Right with David Krayden: David Krayden Reads George Orwell

David Krayden Reads George Orwell's Animal Farm: Chapter 6

David Krayden — Sun, 14 Jan 2024 15:12:51 GMT

In Chapter 6, we continue to see the gradual deterioration of the socialist utopia on Animal Farm. There are many references to actual events in the history of the Soviet Union, including the decision to commence trade and relations with the capitalist world, the issuing of a death sentence against Leon Trotsky, the discovery of imaginary “wreckers” of Soviet industry and the escalating double standard between the communist leadership and the masses.

It struck me as I read this chapter that while it is wholesale fantasy to write that a human solicitor would sign a contract with a pig named Napoleon to be the legal representative for a farm run by animals to the outside world, we are almost prepared to accept this fiction because we know the horrendous hypocrisy, venality and tyranny displayed by the pigs in Animal Farm was mirrored in real life by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin and his minions.

We cannot help but feel sympathy for the animals who work 60-hour weeks, seven days a week because they believe their labour will benefit them, when in fact, it is only making life easier for the pigs.

The farm’s commandments are amended again in this chapter. Hitherto, animals were not permitted to sleep in beds — as humans do — now the proscription refers to animals sleeping in beds “with sheets.”

The rules are always a-changing.

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David Krayden Reads George Orwell's Animal Farm: Chapter 5

David Krayden — Tue, 05 Dec 2023 20:44:15 GMT

Chapter 5 is the beginning of the end of the Animal Farm utopia. Napoleon (Stalin) takes out Snowball (Trotsky) with the help of some vicious dogs (the NKVD) that he has trained for this purpose. There are no more democratic votes; a committee makes all the decisions. And any good idea from the dissidents was never their idea at all.

Animal Farm is all about hypocrisy. As I write this, one of the worst examples of international hypocrisy is unfolding in Dubai at the COP28 climate change summit. They don’t think we know it’s an exercise not only in futility but utter nonsense: a conference like this in the desert? Do they not see the irony, the hypocrisy, the idiocy?

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David Krayden Reads George Orwell's Animal Farm, Chapter 4

David Krayden — Sat, 02 Dec 2023 21:22:23 GMT

Well, here we are in chapter 4 of George Orwell’s Animal Farm, the attempted revenge of Mr. Jones. The drunken farmer returns to the farm with a gang of supporters from adjoining lots and tries to forcefully take back his land. The animals repulse their attack, injuring several and killing one. One sheep is killed.

The scene of course is reminiscent of how several capitalist countries converged on the Soviet Union after the end of the First World War and attempted to overthrow the Bolshevik regime. The newly formed Red Army, headed by Leon Trotsky (Snowball in this book) managed to defeat the allied forces. However, the bloodies civil war in history lay ahead for the new regime before Vladimir Lenin could consolidate his power over the entire country.

After their victory, the animals institute two medals for bravery.

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David Krayden Reads George Orwell's Animal Farm, Chapter 3

David Krayden — Sat, 25 Nov 2023 18:41:28 GMT

Did you get a sense at the end of chapter 2 that something was already going awry with the animals’ revolution? It’s that milk isn’t it? After the animals milk the cows, there’s an abundance of milk produced and it just seems to disappear. Well, by the end of chapter 3, we learn that milk and apples are to be reserved for the pigs — the revoluntary elites — because they need it for the sustenance of their brains. And — I love this — SCIENCE proves it! Doesn’t that remind you of all the nonsense that governments of our day shove down your throats in the name of science? Just think of how the COVID-19 vaccine was good science; how a mask that was little more than a talisman was going to save you from all those pandemic germs; how staying six feet away from everybody was also a certain way to avoid getting sick — it was all based on science, supposedly. But now we now the science was only ideology-deep.

There is a hint in this chapter that the Marxist dictum, “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs,” is a sham doctrine that will result in some working twice as hard as their peers and others doing absolutely nothing to contribute to the “public good” except providing the orders, the direction and the punishment for those not working hard enough. That is the essence of communism right there. Just think of the famine produced by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin: you might call it “Stalin’s Farm,” where the state stold the crops from the most productive farmers and sent to the cities. The people producing the food starved even as they produced “according to their ability.”

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David Krayden Reads George Orwell's Animal Farm, Chapter 2

David Krayden — Thu, 23 Nov 2023 18:01:28 GMT

In chapter 2 of Animal Farm, old Major, the old bore who has encouraged the other animals to rebel against the humans who enslave and expoit them, dies. Old Major clearly represents Karl Marx but also a bit of Vladimir Lenin. the great animal revolution takes place quite by accident and Mr. Jones loses control of a “Manor Farm” that becomes “Animal Farm.” The revolution and the animals are led by two pigs — Napoleon and Snowball — and they draft a series of commandments that end with the declaration that “All animals are equal.”

Somehow we know that this solemn pledge will soon be forsaken.

Napoleon clearly represents Joseph Stalin as Snowball does Leon Trotsky.

Although Napoleon clearly betrays the revolution, with the implication being that the pure philsophy of old Major has been distorted or improperly applied, Orwell leaves it to the reader to decide whether things would have turned out any differently if old Major had lived to implement his revolution. I believe that by the time Orwell died, he would have said that Marxism as an ideology was ripe for exploitation and was intrinsically evil with a tendancy towards totalitarian rule that subjected individual rights to the authority of the state. That is certainly my interpretation of Marxist ideology and its application to whatever state or culture on the face of the earth.

More about that later.

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David Krayden Reads George Orwell's Animal Farm, Chapter 1

David Krayden — Mon, 20 Nov 2023 18:52:02 GMT

Animal Farm was George Orwell’s first very successful book. Released in 1945 it is in many ways a precursor to the longer and larger 1984. Most of Orwell’s books, up to this point, had had respectable sales in Britain and attracted some interest in the United States market but Animal Farm was his first best-seller, earning Orwell substantial earnings as an author.

It continues to sell briskly today, almost 80 years later.

It can truthfully be said that this book can be read by everyone from children to graduate students. It is a fable, a fantasy, a political allegory, a clever tale about the danger of political systems resulting from revolutions becoming worse than the systems they replaced. It is a story about power corrupting personalities and ideals. It is a treatise about the failure of the Russian revolution to deliver the freedom it promised to the masses and instead providing Joseph Stalin, purges, gulags and bullets to the back of heads. But it is also a warning about regimes that justify their existence upon ideology only and govern without the consent of the people.

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David Krayden Reads George Orwell's "Politics and the English Language," Part II

David Krayden — Fri, 17 Nov 2023 16:58:18 GMT

So it’s decided! We will be starting George Orwell’s Animal Farm next week!

But first, the second part of “Politics and the English Language.” It was published in 1946 before Orwell wrote 1984. In many ways this essay serves as a precursor to everything the writer would say about Newspeak in the later novel. In this treatise he explains how language is being abused and distorted by politics and ideology; how words with literal meaning are being replaced by phrases that are “tacked together.” Orwell famously writes that “the word Fascism now has no meaning except in so far as it signifies ‘something not desirable.’” The essay is a brilliant anticipation of what we today call “talking points,” the repetition of stock phrases and political jargon that are used by all politicians, government departments and corporate spokespersons. Once again, Orwell was increcibly prescient about where both language and political discourse was headed.

Notice how he writes about euphemisms being used to disguise atrocities and crimes. He mentions “pacification” as a word applied to the murder of innocent civilians. That was almost 30 years before the Nixon administration referred to its invasion of Cambodia as the “accelerated pacification” of the Vietcong! Today, when we are in the midst of hellish wars that engulf whole civilian populations, politicians, generals and the media speak about “collateral damage.”

Orwell never ceases to amaze!

Or how about this brilliant bit of analysis: “Political language — and with varying degree this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists — is designed to make lies sound truthful and lies sound truthful, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.”

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David Krayden Reads George Orwell's "Politics and the English Language"

Wed, 15 Nov 2023 16:50:51 GMT

We’ll be starting another George Orwell novel soon but first I wanted to share this famous essay with you, “Politics and the English Language,” published before Orwell wrote 1984 but in many ways it serves as a precursor to everything the writer would say about Newspeak in the later novel. In this treatise he explains how language is being abused and distorted by politics and ideology; how words with literal meaning are being replaced by phrases that are “tacked together.” Orwell writes that “the word Fascism now has no meaning except in so far as it signifies ‘something not desirable.’” The essay is a brilliant anticipation of what we today call “talking points,” the repetition of stock phrases and political jargon that are used by all politicians, government departments and corporate spokespersons. Once again, Orwell was incredibly prescient about where both language and political discourse was headed.

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AUDIO BOOK: 1984: Complete Chapters with Commentary: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984 Podcast

David Krayden — Mon, 23 Oct 2023 18:29:50 GMT

Welcome to the 1984 Audiobook complete chapters with my commentary. I hope you enjoy George Orwell’s final novel, 1984 or Nineteen-Eighty-Four, as much as I have enjoyed reading it out loud. This Audiobook has evolved from my David Krayden Reads George Orwell Podcast, exclusive to Substack which I have read with commentary over the last couple of months.

I have always loved George Orwell, since my university days, but his literary works really deserve to be revisited today as his vision and insights are increasingly becoming our reality today.

I have included an essay I have written about George Orwell in this public portion of this Substack.

For paid subscribers, you will have access to the complete 1984 Audiobook links along with commentary.

If you want to get right into it, then immediately after the paywall, I have included the chapters in chronological order.
Also included after the paywall are my original personal insights on the book regarding how it relates to today’s current events and politics both within the written commentary, that includes a chapter synopsis, which can serve as a reading guide.

David Krayden reads George Orwell Podcast, exclusive to Substack.

Thank you for joining me here on my Substack to celebrate George Orwell. My hope is in reading this audiobook compilation, you will consider sharing it widely and use it to help wake our family and friends up, before it is too late.

Let me know what you think about George Orwell’s novel 1984, about my essay, and about this Audiobook compilation. And what you would like to hear me read next.

-David Krayden (@davidkrayden)

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ESSAY: Why George Orwell Really Matters Today

George Orwell is one of the few people whose last names have come to describe an odious political condition, a particular dystopia and state of mind — “Orwellian” is how we describe the kind of censorship and cancel culture that thrives in what used to be traditional democratic states.

Yet, Orwell was his pen name. Eric Arthur Blair, aka George Orwell, was a socialist who voted for the British Labour Party, but he was never comfortable with socialism or the inevitable excesses of the state that would be used to enforce socialist dogma.

He mocked the tendency of socialists to mandate what one ate, who one supported and ultimately how one thought.

Why 1984?

Well, I think that's pretty obvious.

Aren't we living in an age that could be characterized as something akin to the novel 1984, with its increasing state authoritarianism? 1984 is Orwell’s timeless classic that just continues to become more frighteningly real in the age of the World Economic Forum, COVID-19 mandates and the authoritarian efforts to censor speech and eradicate “disinformation” with legislation entitled the “Online Safety Act.”

When you listen to the words of this book, you are listening to Orwell’s thoughts as he denounces collectivism and, conceivably, realizes that socialism is inextricably tied to the state coercion that he despised so much.

You are also listening to an eerily prophetic description of the age in which we now live.

We have constant wars — war without end — where we are in constant conflict with somebody. This has been the case for decades now. And we also have these emergencies — chronic, excessive catastrophic emergencies. COVID-19 is one example of this state of constant emergency, that allows the state to usurp our rights, to take away our freedoms, to force us to do things.

And, of course, the surveillance state is very real today. Big Brother and all big tech, is indeed watching all of us.

With censorship laws on the horizon, and actively happening now in most western democracies, including Canada, that's precisely why this book fascinates. Why this book is compelling.

And why this book is so damn frightening.

-David Krayden on George Orwell’s 1984

And in the process, we are weaker. And this is what 1984 is all about.

But it's also about how language has been destroyed, how it has been degraded, how it becomes deteriorated, because the state insists that black is white that night is day.

We have governments today that are literally telling all of us that black is white.

And 2 + 2 = 5.

That truth is lies.

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Who is George Orwell?

George Orwell, of course, as many of you know, was his pen name. And although everybody knew him is George Orwell, his real name was Eric Arthur Blair.

He was in the foreign service in his first career and served in Burma, which was the basis of his novel Burmese Days (1934), his first novel, written just after the modst success of the non-fictional Down and Out in Paris in London (1933).

He certainly did a lot in his short life. And he did not live very long. He was a very prolific writer, not only of novels and non-fiction accounts of poverty and civil war but journalism as well. But he wrote hundreds of columns. Column after column, after column, and his collected works make up three vast volumes.

I’ve read them all.

I have always really enjoyed George Orwell as an author because as somebody once said, he writes like somebody thinking out loud. It is as somebody would talk to you, as if they're telling you a story. And that, of course, is supposed to be the basis, the foundation of journalism, it's supposed to be like telling you a story where the reporter tells the most important things first, using the inverted pyramid. Anyone who has been to journalism school knows that.

When I was in journalism school, at Carleton University, my first year, we were told to read 1984. And, you know, I don't know if I had actually ever read 1984 until that assignment was given to me. I certainly knew about the book; virtually everybody knows about the book. People know “1984” means something sinister. It represents dystopic, dystopian state of the future, which I think we're fast becoming.

But journalism schools in those days at least still believed that journalists should tell the truth and that there was such a thing as objective truth. And that George Orwell had something important to say.

I doubt very much it is on as many reading lists today, because most journalists today are largely partisan to the point that they don't believe in objective truth anymore. They believe in pushing and promoting a certain policy or certain political idea, at the expense sometimes of their own credibility and of their own integrity. And this is what impresses me about George Orwell.

Well, I get comments all the time from people who watch my broadcasts or read my columns and they say, don't you know George Orwell was a socialist. Well, of course, I know George Orwell was a socialist. He voted for the Independent Labour Party in Great Britain. Probably the last vote he ever cast was for the Labour Party, but that's what makes him interesting is because he was a socialist who actually knew and understood the working class and who was not afraid to criticize the socialist political elites, whom he called “parlour Bolsheviks.”

He lived and worked with the working class, Down and Out in Paris and London is a literary documentary of his experiencing doing menial labour in some of the dirtiest kitchens within some of the best hotels in Europe. And describing how he lived in these circumstances and the environment he lived and worked in while receiving starvation wages. Sometimes he's between jobs, earning nothing. And this is at the height of the Great Depression in Europe, which was as bad and probably worse than what we experienced in North America — in Canada and the United States.

So, he understood the working class and poverty.

And his book, The Road to Wigan Pier (1936), is a classic about poverty. He visits Welsh miners, spending time with these families. And he understands their needs. But yet he doesn't emerge from these experiences as some rabid Bolshevik.

His socialism is the kind of socialism that says, wouldn't it be nice if people just looked after each other and treated each other kinder. And that the state needs to look after the neediest.

He's not into the authoritarianism. He's not attracted to pigeonholing people. He's not enthused about classifying everybody into a widget. He's not obsessed by control. And somehow, and in his early days, he thinks you can achieve socialism without the state being that involved.

The more you get into this book [1984], the more you realize there's so many truths here.

-David Krayden on George Orwell’s 1984

I'm not saying he's a social anarchist. But he really does believe the state should be kept at arm's length. And somehow, socialism would just arrive in a timely fashion. And people should just treat each other in a more equitable manner.

He’s a bit naive about this. But at the same time, he's a socialist who is uncomfortable with socialism. He's uncomfortable with socialists, who are haranguing people, who are telling people how to live, what to drink, how to drink, what to eat, and how to dress. He already sees that this is what the Left is about. It's about controlling everything you think, say or do or wear, or eat or drink, or, how you think. He’s understanding this very early in his career — what socialism is really all about. For most people anyway, but not for him, socialism is actually about controlling the way people think. And this, inevitably and ultimately, evolves into 1984.

He fights as a volunteer in Spain, not for the for the Stalinist-backed Loyalists, and certainly not for the Fascists, but for the anarchists. This is because he understands that Stalin is behind much of the leftist movement in Europe, Stalin is controlling it. That the Soviet Union is behind it. Whether they're shoving people into gulags, as opposed to concentration camps, it’s the same thing. The Stalinist regime was controlling everybody and killing people by the millions. And it's all about state control. And Orwell is not comfortable with this.

And of course, when he writes the novel in 1948, Hitler may be gone, but Stalin is at the peak of his power and is dominating all of Eastern Europe and is threatening the world and is one year away from possession of the atomic bomb.

So ultimately, just before he dies, he wrote 1984. And it's a classic and remains a classic. He decides the future is bleak if the state is going to be worshipped by the masses.

Why did he call it 1984?

Well, I alluded to the fact that he wrote the book in 1948. So, what he did was he inverted the last two numerals of the year he was living in 1948, became 1984. And that's how the book got the title.

And he wrote the book and unfortunately, never really saw the huge success it became. He knew it was successful, but he didn't know it was going to become a multi-million best seller. Or, that it would become something that was on the curriculum of universities the world over. That it would be hailed as a modern-day masterpiece of political theory. He never saw that, because he died in 1950 at 47 years of age. He didn't even make 50 years old, which is very, very sad.

But his book lives on. And in many ways, 1984 the novel, is where we're at today. And as I read this book, I think it's going to become apparent why 1984 is where we're at today, because we are living in an in an age of Newspeak, which Orwell talks about along with doublethink.

Conclusion

I must admit that when I watch the news lately, I sometimes think I am watching a film or something that is unreal. We are edging towards a nuclear catastrophe and democratic governments along with the mainstream media are cheering on the conflict. Has the world gone mad?

We have been talking about the world becoming more Orwellian for so long, but it has now become a reality, no longer a warning.

If we are to fight back, we will need to sustain our freedom of speech and that means to stop allowing people like Justin Trudeau and leaders in the developed countries to undermine our freedom of speech. As 1984 teaches us, we who know what freedom is must ensure that the next generation understands how fragile that freedom can be in the hands of governments and global agents who are anxious to take our liberty away and replace it with serfdom.

So that’s the George Orwell we know.

We know him from his most famous book 1984. Within it you have seen how we must unify to stop the authoritarian impulse.

I think, as much as Orwell appealed to people of all classes, we must today appeal to people of all political ideologies and say, very strongly, that we need free speech.

It is time to fight back.

As George Orwell said, “It is up to us.”

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Appendix: The Principles of Newspeak. David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Mon, 16 Oct 2023 15:57:52 GMT

The appendix of 1984 is an explanation — from the point of view of the Big Brother state — of how Newspeak works. It might be described from an objective point of view as the deterioration of language with a view to making it impossible to articulate truth, unorthodoxy or opposition to the state.

THE FINAL CHAPTER: Part III, Chapter 6: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Tue, 10 Oct 2023 19:15:02 GMT

Part III, Chapter 6 contains our last moments with Winston. He is a broken man with a redundant job who spends his idle hours drinking clove-flavored gin at the Chestnut Tree Cafe. Gin dominates much of his life and he can scarcely function without its habitual assistance. He worries about the war going badly for Oceania.

He has met Julia since being released from prison but the two have little to say and there is not even a hint of physical attraction left. The two speak of seeing each other again but neither is apparently serious about doing so.

In the final pages of the book, Winston learns two things: that Oceania has won the greatest victory in military history against Eurasia and that he has learned to love Big Brother.

Whether a bullet actually enters the back of his head as he discovers that he finally loves the mustachioed dictator, is a matter of debate.

He belongs completely to the Party and the State.

Part III, Chapter 1: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Tue, 10 Oct 2023 16:37:40 GMT

Part III, Chapter 1 in Winston in jail. He is hungry, in pain and terrified. He meets other people that he knows including one man who is fully convinced that he deserved to be caught and arrested. He even praises his daughter for turning him in. He is like the good Bolshevik who is convinced his own unorthodoxy has betrayed the revolution.

Everyone is petrified of returning to Room 101.

Winston keeps wondering if the Brotherhood will come through with a razor blade so that he might take his own life.

But when O’Brien enters his cell, Winston at first believes he has been arrested too. But no, O'Brien will be his interrogator.

Part III, Chapter 5: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Sat, 07 Oct 2023 15:42:04 GMT

Part III, Chapter 5 is the briefest chapter in the book. Winston is taken to Room 101, where O’Brien shows his prisoner his worst terror: rats.

Winston has a complete mental breakdown.

Part III, Chapter 4: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Fri, 06 Oct 2023 19:26:00 GMT

We have two chapters to go. Not one as I said in the introduction. In Part II, Chapter IV, we find Winston gaining weight and slowly recovering from the abuses heaped upon him. He has become perfectly compliant and is ready and willing to be reeducated. But he knows, he is still not completely with the regime heart and soul.

And O’Brien knows that too. He asks Winston how he feels about Big Brother. Does he love him or hate him"?

“I hate him,” Winston says.

It is time for him to visit Room 101.

Part III, Chapter 3: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Wed, 04 Oct 2023 18:05:38 GMT

This is one of many lines in Part III, Chapter 3, that area usually found in any list of famous quotations from George Orwell. The passage is almost a non-stop monologue from O’Brien who explains that “power is not a means; power is an end.”

It is a startling vision of the future and is it an accurate depiction of our present?

Both are equally frightening. We find Winston in jail in Part III, Chapter 1. He is hungry, in pain and terrified. He meets other people that he knows including one man who is fully convinced that he deserved to be caught and arrested. He even praises his daughter for turning him in. He is like the good Bolshevik who is convinced his own unorthodoxy has betrayed the revolution.

Everyone is petrified of returning to Room 101.

Winston keeps wondering if the Brotherhood will come through with a razor blade so that he might take his own life.

But when O’Brien enters his cell, Wins…

Part III, Chapter 2: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Tue, 03 Oct 2023 14:13:09 GMT

After enduring days, weeks or months of chronic torture, O’Brien acts as Winston’s Grand Inquisitor and explains why two and two must sometimes make five for obedient citizens in the Big Brother state. And sometimes three.

O’Brien subjects Winston to electro-shock treatment and tells Winston that he is insane and imagines things that he believes actually happened in the past. He must be cured.

The chapter ends with Winston wanting to know what exactly awaits him in Room 101.

Part II, Chapter 10: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Sat, 30 Sep 2023 12:56:25 GMT

Part II, Chapter 10 is a truly frightening segment of 1984 because it deals with betrayal and presumption. Winston and Julia are betrayed by Mr. Charrington, the antique store owner, who, we discover is really a member of the Thought Police. Winston and Julia are arrested, humiliated and made to realize that there is no escape from the long arm of the state. Of course, we could all see this coming. But when one’s private life is discovered by the state and the Gestapo is at your door, it is somehow always both unexpected and anticipated: perhaps an actual occurrence of doublethink.

Winston had presumed he had found a safe haven; it always imagined discovery would come, but not in his sanctuary of peace, passion and privacy.

Winston Smith has been marked for reeducation, vaporization or perhaps both.

Part II, Chapter 9b: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Wed, 27 Sep 2023 23:14:25 GMT

Part II, Chapter 9b, Winston reads the first chapter of Goldstein’s The Theory and Practice Oligarchical Collectivism and learns how the Big Brother state has learned to us the language of freedom to justify the reality of absolute state control. Orwell even notes how Oceania uses racial equity to create a false sense of real equality. The most fascinating section deals with the falsification of history which of course the Trudeau government attempted to do in the aftermath of the terrible decision to invite a former Waffen SS Nazi to Parliament and honor him during the speech by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

1984 is not history. It is happening.

Part II, Chapter 9a: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Mon, 25 Sep 2023 21:30:25 GMT

I have divided Part II, Chapter 9 into sections a and b because of the length. Winston finally begins reading the forbidden book by Emmanuel Goldstein, The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism.

The part about how continuous war exists between Oceania, Eurasia and Eastasia is fascinating, especially how it describes the purpose of this conflict as the deliberate use of the means of production to build armaments that will either be destroyed or become obsolescent and as a way of keeping the population enslaved at home. “War is Peace” because continuous war is like peace; it is merely an exercise in state control, and no one ever expects to win or lose in the end.

Part II, Chapter 8: David Krayden Reads George Orwell's 1984

David Krayden — Sun, 24 Sep 2023 00:44:01 GMT

In Part II, Chapter 8 both Winston and Julia visit O’Brien at his opulent house with plush carpets and a servant. The three share a glass of wine and fresh tobacco. Winston risks everything in life to tell O’Brien that he believes this Inner Party member is secretly working against the state and Big Brother. O’Brien says he is indeed a member of a mystical Brotherhood that is committed to destroying the current regime. He tells Winston and Julia that if they join the conspiracy, they could be asked to do anything from murder to spreading venereal disease.

O’Brien calls them all “the dead” because they cannot really expect to live to see the new world of freedom.