“How could you tell how much of it was lies?” The controversy of truth in George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four

Abstract

Abstract This article considers the controversial nature of truth in George Orwell's Nineteen Eight-Four, both within the novel itself and in critical responses to it. It suggests a new account of the nature of the control exercised by the Party and the resultant schizophrenia induced by “doublethink”; the Party imposes two different and competing attitudes to truth on the people of Oceania. These might be described as “truth-committed” and “non truth-committed” attitudes (Routledge and Chapman, Forum for Modern Language Studies 39: 1–14, 2003). When we are free to choose between these two attitudes, both can form part of our everyday, non-pathological encounters. The non truth-committed approach is typical of encounters with literary texts, and this article argues that such an approach can enable the reader to dispense with too strong a concern for the factual veracity of Orwell's apparent predictions, and to concentrate on the literary qualities of his novel.