This quote comes up when Winston is thinking of the Party’s control over history and therefore, memory. The Party slogan is a strong example in which the Party can keep its people in the dark and psychologically make them weak because they don’t know what real history is. Throughout the story Winston has worked in the Records Department in the Outer Party and has been changing history at the orders of the Party. Winston knows a lot of what is true but since he is constantly changing history he begins to lose sight on what the past really is. By representing the slogan, “Who controls the past controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” (Orwell, 35) The Party is saying that we know what the past is and you don’t have to worry about what it is because we can tell you it and it will be the truth. This strategy the Party imposes on its people with this is that humans tend to change their future based on how the past had been. If it was a very pleasant past then everyone would want to re-create it. If it was a horrible past then everyone would want to change it and make the future brighter. Throughout the story the Party keeps telling its people that the past was very corrupt with slavery and saying that this occurred from us humans which then made the people want to work to achieve the Party goals of a better future. Winston is the only one, he thinks, that still remembers parts of the past and he is working towards diminishing the Party in the novel. Winston doesn’t believe in this slogan and thinks that the Party is manipulating its people thus, creating a more horrible future compared to the past. He finally understands that he is right from Goldstein’s book when he talked about the past being much better than it is now. This tells Winston that he is not crazy and the past had been better than how it is now. History is the Party’s way of complete power over its people and its control on Oceana and although people may disagree with the Party rules, the majority still agrees and lives on the properties of the Party.
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