Date: 1949

"And yet the rage that one felt was an abstract, undirected emotion which could be switched from one object to another like the flame of a blowlamp."

— Orwell, George (1903-1950)

Date: 1971

"Everything spun around him; then his mind blanked, like a TV suddenly switched off."

— Jerzy N. Kosinski (1933-1991)

Date: 1984

"Case felt as though his brain were jammed."

— Gibson, William (b. 1948)

Date: 1984

"Sandstorms raged across the scoured floor of his skull, generating waves of high thin static that broke behind his eyes, spheres of purest crystal, expanding."

— Gibson, William (b. 1948)

Date: 1985

"In the dark the mind runs on like a devouring machine, the only thing awake in the universe."

— Delillo, Don (b. 1936)