animal farm 2

PG. 1Animal Farm Eric Arthur Blair, better known by his
psuedonym George Orwell, is an English author commonly known to
write about political issues. Orwell has been highly acclaimed and
criticized for his novels, including one of his most famous, Animal Farm.
In a satirical form, George Orwell uses personified farm animals to
express his views on stalinism in thenovel Animal Farm. Throughout
Orwell's early novels, democratic socialism kept the author from total
despair of all humans(Greenblatt 104). After his better experience in the
Spanish Civil War and the shock of the Nazi-Soviet pact, Orwell
developed Animal Farm. The socialismOrwell believed in was not a
hardheaded "realistic" approach to society and polotics but arather
sentimental, utopian vision of the world as a "raft sailing through space,
with, potentially, plenty of provisions for everybody"(Grennblatt 106).
Animal Farm is a satirical beast fable which has been heralded as
Orwell's lightest,gayest work(Brander 126). It is a novel based on the first
thirty years of the Soviet Union, areal society pursuing the ideal of
equality. His book argues that this kind of society has notworked and
could not (Meyers 102). Animal Farm has also been known as a an
enter-taining, witty tale of a farm whose oppressed animals, capable of
speech and reason, overcome a cruel master and set up a revolutionary
government(Meyers 103). On another,more serious level, it is a political
allegory, a symbolic tale where all the events and characters represent
events and characters in Russian history since 1917(Meyers 103).
Orwell uses actual historical events to construct Animal Farm, but
rearranges themto fit his plot. Manor Farm is Russia, Mr. Jones the Tsar,
the pigs the Bolsheviks who led therevolution. The humans represent the
ruling class, the animals the workers and the peasants. Old Major, the
inspiration of the rebellion, is a combination of Marx, the chief theorist and
Lenin, the actual leader(Meyers 105). Old Major dies before the rebellion
just as Lenin did inthe Russian revolution. In actuality Stalin and Trotsky

argue over power after Lenin's death,which Orwell satirizes in Napolean
and Snowball. In Animal Farm, Orwell immediately establishes the
Soviet political allegory as OldMajor (Marx/Lenin) describes the
exploitation of animals by humans and the statement "allanimals are
comrades." The animals continuous singing of "Beasts of England" can
be seen not only as a symbol of the decay of communist notions of a
perfect state, but also as Orwell's more general comment on the decline
of true liberty and equality in the west(Gardner 99). The progress of the
revolution from a common idealism to a state system of leader,police, and
workers happens rather rapidly. The animals take over the farm and the
pigs ( Bolsheviks ) emerge as natural organizers. The pigs rduce the
principles of animalism inseven simple commandments and develop a
green and white version of the Russian hammerand sickle flag. Instead,
theirs has "a hoof and horn which signifies the future Republic of the
animals which would arise when the human race had been finally
overthrown"(Orwell 89).Orwell demonstrates both the greed and the
hypocracy involved in the urge to power whenthe clever pigs contribute to
none of the work and keep for themselves all the milk and apples.
During the novel, the pigs continue to gain more and more power. In the
pigs upriseof power, the Seven Commandments are an effective
structural device. Their different alterations resemble the pigs'
progressive rise to power. The pigs' gradual acquisition of priveleges-
apples, milk, house, whisky, beer, clothes- leads to the final identification
of pigand human, Communist and capitalist(Gardner 101). The blurring
of the past and the hardening shape of the present, grim, greedy, orjust
pragmatic, are accompanied by betrayal of the spirit of the revolution
exemplified in the ammendments made into the "Seven Commandments"
of "Animalism"(Gardner 102). Costantly these are changed by one of the
deceiving pigs, Squealer. The puzzled animalscan not figure out with
trying to keep pace with the pigs increasing authority. So the

commandments such as, "No animal shall sleep in a bed" becomes,
when the pigs move into the farmhouse, "No animal shall sleep in a bed
with sheets." Also, after the savage killings"No animal shall kill another" is
modified by the addition of "without a cause." Each event that occurs in
Animal Farm has a historical parallel(Meyers 106).The Rebellion is the
October 1917 Revolution, the Battle of the Cowshed is the
subsequentCivil War, Mr. Jones and the farmers represent the loyalist
Russians, the hen's revolt standsfor the brutally suppressed 1921 mutiny
of the sailors, Napolean's deal with Whymper represents Russia's 1922
Treaty of Rapallo with Germany(Meyers 106). The mostsignificant of all
the events is the building of the windmill, which in Soviet terms
representsindustrialization(Meyers 107). Orwell ends the novel with a
satiric portrait of the TeheranConference of 1943, the meeting of
Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin who are now allies(Raymond).
Throughout the entire book, the pigs gradually gravitate towards the
human world.First, through trade and alliances with Mr.Frederick. The
selling of timber to Mr. Frederick of Pinchfield is the animal equivalent of
the short-lived Nazi-Soviet nonaggression pact of 1939(Gardner 105).
Then as the pigs celebrate the Pyrrhic victory at the Battle of theWindmill,
they drink alcohol. More and more has Napolean, now "elected"
president,become the remote object of a personality cult in a system
marked by "readjustment" ofrations for workers and the empty "dignity of"
more songs, more speeches, and moreprocessions(Gardner 105).
Despite this, all the animals, except the pigs, still hope for daysbefore the
Rebellion. They figured if they worked hard, at least, they worked for
themselves."No creature among them went upon two legs"(Orwell 36).
"No creature called another creature 'Master'"(Orwell 38). "All animals
were equal"(Orwell 62). Orwell finishes Animal Farm with a surprise
ending. He demonstrates the pigs'complete corruptness as they walk on
their hind legs. The pigs train all the young sheep towalk on their hind

legs and chant "Four legs good, two legs better." Orwell throws in
ironythroughout the novel to show that not all the animals are fair and
equal. On the whole, Orwell's intentions to discredit the Soviet system by
showing its inhumanity and its back-sliding from ideals is achieved. It is
Orwell's sharpness ofvisualization and emotional resonance that have
ensured Animal Farm what seems to bea permanent place in
literature(Gardner 107). Graham Greene rightly noted in his review thatwe
"become involved in the fate of the animals. We care about them too
much merely to translate events into their historical equivalent." There is
no such possibility in Animal Farm,nor, by the end , can we escape the
weight of the book's sadness by thinking that these things have only
happened to animals(Gardner 107). We look from the oppressed animals
in the book to the oppressed human beings outside and back again, and
can see no difference(Gardner 107).Work CitedDISCovering Authors,
Gale Research Inc., 1993 .[computer]Gardner, Averil. George Orwell.
Boston, G.K. Hall and Co.: 1987.Meyers, Valerie. Modern Novelists
George Orwell. St. Martin's Press: New York, 1991.Orwell, George.
Animal Farm. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich Inc., 1946.Schorer,
Mark. "An Indigent and Prophetic Novel." The New York Times Book
Review, 1949.Williams, Raymond. George Orwell; A Collection of Critical
Essays. New Jersey, Prentice- Hall, Inc.: 1974.Woodcock, George. The
Crystal Spirit: A Study of George Orwell. Little, Brownn, and Company,
1966.