Nineteen Eighty-Four/Part 1/Chapter 5

At lunchtime, Winston talks to Syme, who is working on the eleventh edition of the official Newspeak dictionary. As Syme explains, why should there be so many synonyms and antonyms of "good" when "plusgood" can mean "very good" and "ungood" can mean bad, "doubleplusgood" mean extremely good, and so on? The hope of the Party is that with a smaller and smaller vocabulary, Thoughtcrime would be near impossible. As much as Syme is orthodox, Winston worries that he is too smart for his own good and may be vaporized by the Party. When Mr. Parsons arrives, he asks Winston for his "voluntary" donations which take up a quarter of his income. Again, the dark-haired girl catches his attention.