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George Orwell 1 9 8 4<br />
Why did you have to endure it, since the end was<br />
always the same? Why was it not possible to cut a<br />
few days or weeks out of your life? Nobody ever<br />
escaped detection, and nobody ever failed to confess.<br />
When once you had succumbed to thoughtcrime it<br />
was certain that by a given date you would be dead.<br />
Why then did that horror, which altered nothing,<br />
have to lie embedded in future time?<br />
He tried with a little more success than before to<br />
summon up the image of O'Brien. 'We shall meet in<br />
the place where there is no darkness,' O'Brien had<br />
said to him. He knew what it meant, or thought he<br />
knew. The place where there is no darkness was the<br />
imagined future, which one would never see, but<br />
which, by foreknowledge, one could mystically<br />
share in. But with the voice from the telescreen<br />
nagging at his ears he could not follow the train of<br />
thought further. He put a cigarette in his mouth. Half<br />
the tobacco promptly fell out on to his tongue, a<br />
bitter dust which was difficult to spit out again. The<br />
face of Big Brother swam into his mind, displacing<br />
that of O'Brien. Just as he had done a few days<br />
earlier, he slid a coin out of his pocket and looked at<br />
it. The face gazed up at him, heavy, calm, protecting:<br />
but what kind of smile was hidden beneath the dark<br />
moustache? Like a leaden knell the words came<br />
back at him:<br />
127<br />
¿Para qué sufrir todo esto si el fin era el mismo?<br />
¿Por qué no ahorrarse todo esto? Nadie escapaba a<br />
la vigilancia ni dejaba de confesar. El culpable de<br />
crimental estaba completamente seguro de que lo<br />
matarían antes o después. ¿Para qué, pues, todo ese<br />
horror que nada alteraba?<br />
Por fin, consiguió evocar la imagen de O'Brien.<br />
«Nos encontraremos en el sitio donde no hay<br />
oscuridad», le había dicho O'Brien en el sueño.<br />
Winston sabía lo que esto significaba, o se figuraba<br />
saberlo. El lugar donde no hay oscuridad era el<br />
futuro imaginado, que nunca se vería; pero, por<br />
adivinación, podría uno participar en él<br />
místicamente. Con la voz de la telepantalla<br />
zumbándole en los oídos no podía pensar con<br />
ilación. Se puso un cigarrillo en la boca. La mitad<br />
del tabaco se le cayó en la lengua, un polvillo<br />
amargo que luego no se podía escupir. El rostro del<br />
Gran Hermano flotaba en su mente desplazando al<br />
de O'Brien. Lo mismo que había hecho unos días<br />
antes, se sacó una moneda del bolsillo y la<br />
contempló. El rostro le miraba pesado, tranquilo,<br />
protector. Pero, ¿qué clase de sonrisa se escondía<br />
bajo el oscuro bigote? Las palabras de las<br />
consignas martilleaban el cerebro de Winston:<br />
WAR IS PEACE LA GUERRA ES LA PAZ<br />
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY LA LIBERTAD ES LA ESCLAVITUD<br />
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH LA IGNORANCIA ES LA FUERZA