1984 - Planet eBook

ognized purpose of marriage was to beget children for theservice of the Party. Sexual intercourse was to be looked onas a slightly disgusting minor operation, like having an enema.This again was never put into plain words, but in anindirect way it was rubbed into every Party member fromchildhood onwards. There were even organizations suchas the Junior Anti-Sex League, which advocated completecelibacy for both sexes. All children were to be begottenby artificial insemination (ARTSEM, it was called in Newspeak)and brought up in public institutions. This, Winstonwas aware, was not meant altogether seriously, but somehowit fitted in with the general ideology of the Party. TheParty was trying to kill the sex instinct, or, if it could not bekilled, then to distort it and dirty it. He did not know whythis was so, but it seemed natural that it should be so. Andas far as the women were concerned, the Party’s efforts werelargely successful.He thought again of Katharine. It must be nine, ten—nearly eleven years since they had parted. It was curioushow seldom he thought of her. For days at a time he was capableof forgetting that he had ever been married. They hadonly been together for about fifteen months. The Party didnot permit divorce, but it rather encouraged separation incases where there were no children.Katharine was a tall, fair-haired girl, very straight, withsplendid movements. She had a bold, aquiline face, a facethat one might have called noble until one discovered thatthere was as nearly as possible nothing behind it. Very earlyin her married life he had decided—though perhaps it was