George Orwell quote about power from 1984 - Obedience is not enough. Unless he is suffering, how can you be sure that he is obeying your will and not his own? Power is in inflicting pain and humiliation. Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing.
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Obedience is not enough. Unless he is suffering, how can you be sure that he is obeying your will and not his own? Power is in inflicting pain and humiliation. Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing.
 George Orwell, 1984 (1949). copy citation

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Author George Orwell
Source 1984
Topic power pain obedience
Date 1949
Language English
Reference
Note
Weblink http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks01/0100021.txt

Context

“He paused, and for a moment assumed again his air of a schoolmaster questioning a promising pupil: «How does one man assert his power over another, Winston?»
Winston thought. «By making him suffer,» he said.
«Exactly. By making him suffer. Obedience is not enough. Unless he is suffering, how can you be sure that he is obeying your will and not his own? Power is in inflicting pain and humiliation. Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing. Do you begin to see, then, what kind of world we are creating? It is the exact opposite of the stupid hedonistic Utopias that the old reformers imagined. A world of fear and treachery is torment, a world of trampling and being trampled upon, a world which will grow not less but MORE merciless as it refines itself.” source

Meaning and analysis

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