What might the most powerful person in their world promise on their wedding day?
In the case of Ming The Merciless, he kept it short and unambiguous:
Priest: Do you, Ming the Merciless, Ruler of the Universe, take this Earthling Dale Arden, to be your Empress of the Hour?
Ming: Of the hour, yes.
Priest: Do you promise to use her as you will?
Ming: Certainly!
Priest: Not to blast her into space? [this earns him a Death Glare from Ming] Uh, until such time as you grow weary of her.
Ming: I do.
Ming's wedding vows weren't at all subtle. They could have included "Until death do you part", with Ming murmuring "Her death."
No doubt, England's King Henry VIII promised traditional vows and might have considered his conscience clear since it was a headsman, or an expert swordsman from Calais, who dispatched Queen Catherine (Howard) and Queen Ann Boleyn respectively, and not himself personally.
But, back to Ming. One wonders why he bothered to hold a royal wedding at all, but there are probably some good plot points in it. As the Roman emperors knew, an oppressed populace could be pacified by the occasional --or even regular-- spectacle.
In the case of George Orwell's "1984", perpetual wars were a means of political power. There were three superpowers, and although the alliances varied, two of the three mega states were always at war with the third.
On the point of a useful spectacle, at Ming's wedding, ships fly two banners in the background. The first says "All creatures shall make merry". The second says "Under pain of death".
The illusion of joy is important. The oxymoron of "make merry/or be punished to the max" is great fun. Grammarly explains the rhetorical importance of juxtaposed contradictions very well (other examples, are "deafening silence" and "organized chaos".)
Ming The Merciless would have been well aware that it is important for the oppressed populace to believe that they are having a good time, or that everyone around them is having a good time.
Rowena Cherry
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