Beginning ~ with the clock striking thirteen

I just added George Orwell's classic novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (sometimes written 1984) to my Kindle the other day and was able to locate the sentence J. K. Rowling quoted yesterday to "bash White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and President Donald Trump’s administration."  It's from chapter 3.

"And if all others accepted the lie which the party imposed ― if all records told the same tale ― then the lie passed into history and became truth" (loc. 458).

That sentence was immediately followed by this one, that I remember from reading the book decades ago.

"Who controls the past," ran the Party slogan, "controls the future:  who controls the present controls the past" (loc. 458).

I also looked up this quotation in my new Kindle copy and found it in Chapter 7 (loc. 1098).  This novel was "the best-selling book of any genre" on Amazon in January 2017.  Our current administration has made the book seem like a prediction, rather than fiction.  How in the world did Orwell,  almost seventy years ago, describe today's situation so well?

Oh, yeah, I'm supposed to give the opening lines of the novel in this "Book Beginnings" post.  Here 'tis:

"It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen."

Click to enlarge poster

Surely everyone already knows that eye on the cover of the book represents its most famous saying, but just in case this is all new to you, here's the quote, which was used thrice:

"BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU" (loc. 12, 21, and 3988).

Yes, it's in three places, and all three have every word capitalized.  For what it's worth, 1984 was not supposed to be an instruction manual.

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts Book Beginnings on Fridays. Click here for today's Linky.