Original artwork, not a still
Nineteen Eighty-Four (aka 1984)
A Party slogan, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)
Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.
Behind the line
What it means
Our interpretation.
The slogan is a full theory of power in two sentences: whoever sets the story of the past decides what people will accept about what comes next. It is quoted whenever someone wants to point at rewritten history, deleted records or propaganda, and it is among Orwell's most quoted lines outside the novel.
Context reviewed
In context
Spoilers for Nineteen Eighty-Four (aka 1984)Show the scene
Winston Smith, who works rewriting old newspapers at the Ministry of Truth, recalls this slogan in Part One while thinking about how the Party alters history. If the Party can say that an event never happened, and all records agree, the lie becomes truth. The passage runs on to the Party's name for this mind-trick, 'reality control', which in Newspeak is doublethink.
Sources (1)
- Nineteen Eighty-Four (Wikiquote)Part One, Winston reflecting on the Party's rewriting of the pastReference checked
Context reviewed
