Orwell, George — Nineteen eighty-four [883]

In the face of pain there are no heroes, no heroes, he thought over and over as he writhed on the floor, clutching uselessly at his disabled left arm. — Orwell, George, Nineteen eighty-four, 883

Note

The double repetition of ‘no heroes’ with the broken cadence mirrors the collapse of the rational self under unbearable sensation. ‘Clutching uselessly at his disabled left arm’ — the very gesture of self-protection is useless, dramatizing that the body offers no refuge from the panoptic apparatus. A bleak thesis stated with rhythmical force at the end of the chapter.