One of my students, Dean, has just painted a quote from George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-four on the walls of the classroom (I helped out by painting over the pencil marks in white). Here it is (it requires two photos, since it appears on two facing walls):
I could (and should at some point) say a lot about why I wanted this quote looming over everything that happens in the classroom, but for now I just wanted to show the photos, and to quote the two passages from Nineteen Eighty-Four in which it appears:
The first reference in the book:
The party said that Oceania had never been in alliance with Eurasia. He, Winston Smith, knew thatOceania had been in alliance with Eurasia as short a time as four years ago. But where did that knowledge exist? Only in his own consciousness, which in any case must soon be annihilated. And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed--if all records told the same tale--then the lie passed into history and became truth. 'Who controls the past,' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.' And yet the past, though of its nature alterable, never had been altered. Whatever was true now was true from everlasting to everlasting. It was quite simple. All that was needed was an unending series of victories over your own memory.
The second reference in the book:
O'Brien was looking down at him speculatively. More than ever he had the air of a teacher taking pains with a wayward but promising child.'There is a Party slogan dealing with the control of the past,' he said. 'Repeat it, if you please.''"Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past,"' repeated Winston obediently.'"Who controls the present controls the past,"' said O'Brien, nodding his head with slow approval. 'Is it your opinion, Winston, that the past has real existence?'Again the feeling of helplessness descended upon Winston. His eyes flitted towards the dial. He not only did not know whether 'yes' or 'no' was the answer that would save him from pain; he did not even know which answer he believed to be the true one.O'Brien smiled faintly. 'You are no metaphysician, Winston,' he said. 'Until this moment you had never considered what is meant by existence. I will put it more precisely. Does the past exist concretely, in space? Is there somewhere or other a place, a world of solid objects, where the past is still happening?''No.''Then where does the past exist, if at all?''In records. It is written down.''In records. And----?''In the mind. In human memories.''In memory. Very well, then. We, the Party, control all records, and we control all memories. Then we control the past, do we not?''But how can you stop people remembering things?' cried Winston again momentarily forgetting the dial. 'It is involuntary. It is outside oneself. How can you control memory? You have not controlled mine!'O'Brien's manner grew stern again. He laid his hand on the dial.'On the contrary,' he said, 'YOU have not controlled it. That is what has brought you here. You are here because you have failed in humility, in self-discipline. You would not make the act of submission which is the price of sanity. You preferred to be a lunatic, a minority of one. Only the disciplined mind can see reality, Winston. You believe that reality is something objective, external, existing in its own right. You also believe that the nature of reality is self-evident. When you delude yourself into thinking that you see something, you assume that everyone else sees the same thing as you. But I tell you, Winston, that reality is not external. Reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else. Not in the individual mind, which can make mistakes, and in any case soon perishes: only in the mind of the Party, which is collective and immortal. Whatever the Party holds to be the truth, is truth."