Naomi’s Reviews > Kallocain > Status Update

⭐️Ch.3”If my marriage did not improve, I would get a divorce. But not until the children were past home age.“

Ch.3”…that power was increasingly becoming an oppressive encumbrance at precisely those moments when I yearned most wildly for Linda, and for the never-attained and never attainable miracle that would make me lord of her innermost mysteries. The eye I had wondered about was still there, but the eye was Linda herself.”

Ch.3”Whereas earlier, even in my most intimate activities, I had mainly speculated about how I was valued by the power that also made use of the eye on the wall, nowadays…”

Ch.3”Our World State certainly did not take an ascetic view of sex, for on the contrary the breeding of new fellow soldiers was a necessary and honourable task, and every effort was made to see to it that as soon as they reached the age of maturity men and women had an opportunity of fulfilling their duty in this regard.“

👁️‍🗨️Ch.3”Later, when I obtained such an intimate view of the family lives of various fellow soldiers, I could not help making a close connection between the police ear and police eye and the unsatisfactory curve of the birth rate within the World State. But I hardly think it was because of them that my blood ran so thin nowadays. At least, it had never been like this before.”

Ch.3”On the wall sat the police ear and beside it the police eye, equally effective in darkness and in light. No one could think them anything but well-motivated: what hotbeds of espionage and conspiracy the parents’ rooms might otherwise become, especially if they were also used as guest rooms!“

🌟Ch.3”There was no magical act that could give me the key and the title deeds to the paradise Linda was keeping from me. So then what was the point of it all?

🌟Ch.3”And while the pulse-beats surged in my veins, I turned over on my other side and suppressed a sigh. I told myself that what I wanted from cohabitation between a man and a woman was merely a superstition, and nothing else, just as much of a superstition as when the savages of ancient times ate the hearts of their brave enemies in order to partake of their courage.“

HOLD ON HOLD ON wait was he in such a desperate state that he was like “if Linda dies maybe my life will be better?” Like obviously he needs to get divorced or realize that…what’s happening to him is not living?! But then again when you’re in it sometimes people don’t realize it.