Original artwork, not a still
1984 · 1949
Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them.
Behind the line
What it means
Our interpretation.
Doublethink names the trick of believing a thing and its opposite, and refusing to notice you are doing it. Orwell packed a whole theory of propaganda into one word, which is why people reach for it when politicians or companies contradict themselves with a straight face. It is the engine behind the Party's slogans: war is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength.
Context reviewed
In context
Spoilers for 1984Show the scene
In Part Two, Chapter 9, Winston and Julia, hiding in the room above Mr Charrington's shop, read aloud from The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism, the forbidden book credited to Emmanuel Goldstein, Enemy of the People. In its first chapter, Ignorance is Strength, the book explains how Party members must hold and then forget their own falsifications of the past. The passage defines the Newspeak word doublethink as a deliberate act of conscious and unconscious self-deception. Only afterwards do the Thought Police burst in and arrest the pair.
Sources (1)
- Nineteen Eighty-Four, full text (Project Gutenberg Australia)Part Two, Chapter 9, Goldstein's book, Chapter IReference checked
Context reviewed
