Chap­ter 4 of George Orwell’s 1984 marks a turn­ing point in Winston’s phys­i­cal and men­tal con­di­tion as he expe­ri­ences notice­able improve­ments while being held in the Min­istry of Love. Though the pas­sage of time is dif­fi­cult for him to track, Win­ston per­ceives that he is being pro­vid­ed with three meals a day, grad­u­al­ly gain­ing strength. The min­i­mal com­forts offered to him—such as a mat­tress, a bath, and clean clothes—stand in stark con­trast to the extreme depri­va­tion he endured dur­ing his ear­li­er impris­on­ment. Despite being con­fined, Win­ston finds some com­fort in these small changes, espe­cial­ly the reg­u­lar meals and the occa­sion­al cig­a­rette, although the lat­ter ini­tial­ly caus­es him to feel ill. These phys­i­cal improve­ments serve as a stark reminder of his dete­ri­o­rat­ing men­tal state, where the Par­ty’s con­trol con­tin­ues to infil­trate every aspect of his exis­tence, from his thoughts to his phys­i­cal well-being.

As Winston’s phys­i­cal state improves, he grad­u­al­ly becomes more active, engag­ing in exer­cis­es to regain his strength. This new­found phys­i­cal ener­gy seems to awak­en his mind, prompt­ing him to reflect deeply on his past. He real­izes that his ear­li­er attempts to rebel against the Par­ty were futile; the over­whelm­ing pow­er of the Par­ty had already defeat­ed him long before his actu­al actions. Win­ston acknowl­edges, with a sense of grim accep­tance, that he had sub­con­scious­ly sur­ren­dered to the Party’s author­i­ty long ago, even if he had tried to resist at cer­tain points. His under­stand­ing of this sur­ren­der is painful, as it marks the real­iza­tion that true rebel­lion against the Par­ty is impos­si­ble. Win­ston has come to terms with the fact that the Par­ty’s dom­i­nance extends far beyond phys­i­cal con­trol, reach­ing deep into his con­scious­ness and eras­ing any traces of inde­pen­dent thought or action.

Win­ston then takes a white slate and begins to write down the slo­gans that have been forced upon him, includ­ing “FREEDOM IS SLAVERY” and “TWO AND TWO MAKE FIVE.” These phras­es exem­pli­fy the Party’s relent­less cam­paign to dis­tort truth and shape real­i­ty accord­ing to its own whims. The writ­ing of these slo­gans sig­nals Winston’s forced accep­tance of the Party’s con­trol over both his out­ward actions and inter­nal beliefs. He now under­stands that real­i­ty is not some­thing inher­ent, but some­thing that the Par­ty dictates—anything that con­tra­dicts the Party’s ver­sion of truth is erased. This real­iza­tion forces Win­ston into a state of cog­ni­tive dis­so­nance, where he must train him­self to reject any con­tra­dic­to­ry thoughts, a con­cept known as “crimestop.” This men­tal con­di­tion­ing is a form of psy­cho­log­i­cal war­fare, com­pelling Win­ston to accept the real­i­ty pre­sent­ed by the Par­ty and sup­press any resis­tance to its con­trol.

In the midst of this intense men­tal strug­gle, Win­ston expe­ri­ences a brief, bliss­ful dream of Julia. He calls out her name in a vul­ner­a­ble moment, reveal­ing the lin­ger­ing emo­tion­al con­nec­tion he still has with her despite the Party’s best efforts to erase it. This fleet­ing moment of emo­tion­al clar­i­ty stirs with­in Win­ston an aware­ness of the deep con­flict with­in him: the desire for per­son­al con­nec­tion and truth ver­sus the over­whelm­ing pres­sure to con­form to the Party’s ide­ol­o­gy. His emo­tion­al con­flict inten­si­fies as he real­izes the dan­ger of hold­ing onto his feel­ings for Julia, know­ing that doing so could jeop­ar­dize his sur­vival and com­plete sub­mis­sion to the Par­ty. The ten­sion between per­son­al desires and the Party’s demands for absolute loy­al­ty comes to a head in this moment of intro­spec­tion, high­light­ing the dehu­man­iz­ing effects of total­i­tar­i­an con­trol.

As Winston’s inter­nal bat­tle con­tin­ues, his inter­ac­tions with O’Brien under­score the Party’s absolute con­trol over his thoughts and actions. O’Brien reaf­firms the Party’s stance that Win­ston must not only obey but must learn to gen­uine­ly love Big Broth­er, cement­ing the pow­er of the Par­ty over Winston’s very iden­ti­ty. This dec­la­ra­tion marks the cul­mi­na­tion of Winston’s emo­tion­al strug­gle, sym­bol­iz­ing the ero­sion of his last shred of defi­ance. The con­ver­sa­tion sig­nals the psy­cho­log­i­cal manip­u­la­tion he will endure in the future, leav­ing him with lit­tle hope for escape. The chap­ter clos­es with Win­ston being led toward “Room 101,” a ter­ri­fy­ing place hint­ed at as the site of unimag­in­able tor­ment, sug­gest­ing that Winston’s suf­fer­ing is far from over. The omi­nous men­tion of Room 101 sets the stage for the next stage in Winston’s psy­cho­log­i­cal and phys­i­cal tor­ture, leav­ing the read­er uncer­tain about what hor­rors lie ahead.