"The greatest mistake is to imagine that the human being is an autonomous individual."

First published 28 April 1944

On the night in 1940 when the big ack-ack barrage was fired over London for the first time, I was in Piccadilly Circus when the guns opened up, and I fled into the Café Royal to take cover. Among the crowd inside a good-looking, well-made youth of about twenty-five was making somewhat of a nuisance of himself with a copy of Peace News, which he was forcing upon the attention of everyone at the neighbouring tables. I got into conversation with him, and the conversation went something like this:

The youth: ‘I tell you, it’ll all be over by Christmas. There’s obviously going to be a compromise peace. I’m pinning my faith to Sir Samuel Hoare. It’s degrading company to be in, I admit, but still Hoare is on our side. So long as Hoare’s in Madrid, there’s always hope of a sell-out.’

Orwell: ‘What about all these preparations that they’re making against invasion—the pill-boxes that they’re building everywhere, the L.D.V.s, and so forth?’

The youth: ‘Oh, that merely means that they’re getting ready to crush the working class when the Germans get here. I suppose some of them might be fools enough to try to resist, but Churchill and the Germans between them won’t take long to settle them. Don’t worry, it’ll soon be over.’

Orwell: ‘Do you really want to see your children grow up Nazis?’

The youth: ‘Nonsense! You don’t suppose the Germans are going to encourage Fascism in this country, do you? They don’t want to breed up a race of warriors to fight against them. Their object will be to turn us into slaves. They’ll encourage every pacifist movement they can lay hands on. That’s why I’m a pacifist. They’ll encourage people like me.’

Orwell: ‘And shoot people like me?’

The youth: ‘That would be just too bad.’

Orwell: ‘But why are you so anxious to remain alive?’

The youth: ‘So that I can get on with my work, of course.’

It had come out in the conversation that the youth was a painter—whether good or bad I do not know, but, at any rate, sincerely interested in painting and quite ready to face poverty in pursuit of it. As a painter, he would probably have been somewhat better off under a German occupation than a writer or journalist would be. But still, what he said contained a very dangerous fallacy, now very widespread in the countries where totalitarianism has not actually established itself.

The fallacy is to believe that under a dictatorial government you can be free inside. Quite a number of people console themselves with this thought, now that totalitarianism in one form or another is visibly on the up-grade in every part of the world. Out in the street the loudspeakers bellow, the flags flutter from the rooftops, the police with their tommy-guns prowl to and fro, the face of the Leader, four feet wide, glares from every hoarding; but up in the attics the secret enemies of the régime can record their thoughts in perfect freedom—that is the idea, more or less. And many people are under the impression that this is going on now in Germany and other dictatorial countries.

Why is this idea false? I pass over the fact that modern dictatorships don’t, in fact, leave the loopholes that the old-fashioned despotisms did; and also the probable weakening of the desire for intellectual liberty owing to totalitarian methods of education. The greatest mistake is to imagine that the human being is an autonomous individual. The secret freedom which you can supposedly enjoy under a despotic government is nonsense, because your thoughts are never entirely your own. Philosophers, writers, artists, even scientists, not only need encouragement and an audience, they need constant stimulation from other people. It is almost impossible to think without talking. If Defoe had really lived on a desert island he could not have written Robinson Crusoe, nor would he have wanted to. Take away freedom of speech, and the creative faculties dry up. Had the Germans really got to England my acquaintance of the Café Royal would soon have found his painting deteriorating, even if the Gestapo had let him alone.

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This is an extract from George Orwell’s column in Tribune magazine, first published 28 April 1944. We have shared it before, but we thought it would be of interest to new subscribers.

All rights reserved. This extract remains under copyright in the US and may not be distributed or reused in any way without permission from the Orwell Estate.