ANIMAL FARM

ANIMAL FARM

George Orwell (1903-1950) was a famous English writer who lived in the first half of the twentieth century. He was both a social critic and a chronicler of English culture. He particularly liked to write about the ills of society, especially oppressive governments and Wars. He is the author of 1984, which many consider to be the novel that best anticipated the evils of uncontrolled government surveillance and one of the greatest dystopian novels of all time and another novel about politics that I would like to analyze now, Animal Farm. The reason that I so like this book isthat Orwell had sufficient talent to satirize society and government by using the animals that lived on a farm. That’s a very creative idea and he was so perceptive in his creation of the characters that we sometimes forget that they’re not humans.He focuses on many of the negative aspects of many of political power and how the government controls others by using assorted tricks and tactics, such as the spread of fear, the utilization of what we now refer to as “spin doctors” to change the public’s view of a negative situation and the creation of cults of personality. Today, I will talk about 2 main ideas that I think they make Animal Farm such an excellent book. These are revisionist history and hypocrisy.

The definition of hypocrisy is “pretending to feel or believe something that is different from what you really feel or saying one thing and doing another.“ (Oxford Dictionary of American English for learners, Oxford University presses). We can see hypocrisy very clearly in evidence in Animal Farm and also the corrupting influence of power. Almost politician are hypocrites. They use their showmanship and public speaking talents to give wonderful speeches about how things should be and will be once they are elected. They paint a picture of a new and more just world that appeals to the majority of people, but when the actually come to positions of power, in time they become very little different from the people or regimes that they’ve replaced. Until this is discovered however they have the power to manipulate and control those around them.  In Animal Farm, the pigs create a revolution and write down “The seven commandments” of  life that they will observe now that they are in control of the farm. It doesn’t take very long however before it becomes apparent that there is a disproportionate distribution of both labor and food and that the idealistic ideas of their great revolution begin to slowly be chipped away . For example, one of the commandments is that “No animal shall sleep on the bed.” The animals in the barn abide by this rule exactly but Napoleon breaks the rule by sleeping on the bed (chapter IV). Another example, “No animal shall drink alcohol.” However, the pigs drink Mr. Jones’s wine and later they even sell Boxer when he can’t work anymore to buy whisky for themselves (Chapter VIII and IX).  The pigs are real hypocrites; they wear public masks to make them appear to be good leaders in the other animal’s eyes, but behind their backs, they aren’t worthy as their words.

Another main them is “revisionist history”. The pigs distort history to make themselves always appear to be in the right. For example, Snowball was a hero in the Battle of the Cowshed, “Animal Hero, First Class”. However, Napoleon and Squealer manage to rewrite that fact and claim that Snowball was never an “Animal Hero, First Class.”. The animals note something isn’t right, but they can’t communicate their feelings because they aren’t good speakers or capable of explaining themselves. Even though Napoleon steals the idea about the windmill from Snowball and says to everyone that he is the one who created it, the animals, again, can’t say anything as usual because they can’t remember the details what actually happened. Rulers and governments very frequently take advantage of the poor memories of those who they control to change the truth for their own purposes. People can’t remember the exact details of what has actually occurred and they have no recourse but to believe what they’re told whether they actually feel that it’s wrong or not. In fact, history books are great tools to create a false view of things that have happened particularly when they’re used to plant lies in the minds of impressionable young people. Because they can’t confirm what’s true or not; they have to believe what the books say. Concealingthe bad things and selectively promoting the good things is a deceptive trick that politicians use to control people.

George Orwell is an excellent satirist because he depicts the evils of politics and how power inevitably corrupts individual people, governments and societies. He takes off the masks of the hypocrites who wield power unjustly and exposes their real faces. He also tells us the way that governments try to take control of our minds and lives by using their wicked manipulative tactics. Animal Farm is a world where these evils are laid bare and we can see them exposed more clearly than ever before.