September 22, 2004
We will meet in the place where there is no darkness
Re-read Nineteen eighty-four in a beautiful paperback facsimile first edition.
These things happen," he began vaguely. "I have been able to recall one instance -- a possible instance. It was an indiscretion, undoubtedly. We were producing a definitive edition of the poems of Kipling. I allowed the word 'God' to remain at the end of a line. I could not help it!" he added almost indignanty, raising his face to look at Winston. "It was impossible to change the line. The rhyme was 'rod.' Do you realise that there are only twelve rhymes to 'rod' in the entire language? For days I had racked my brains. There was no other rhyme."
The precepts of doublethink, once a symbol of Totalitarian regimes such as Stalin's (and the mustachioed Big Brother of the book bears an eerie metaphorical likeness to him), makes me wonder: are we actually at war with any country?