Animal Farm

discussion
 Additional information
• Published 1945-46
• Orwell attempts to delineate the impact of II WW,
Economic Depression, Rise of Communism, division of
the world into 2 groups
• Irony- Orwell was a socialist and advocated the rise of
socialism and death of Capitalism but his anti-socialist
works have attained maximum popularity
• As he explains in the essay "Why I Write," "Every line of
serious work I have written since 1936 has been
written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism
and for democratic socialism."
• He wrote the novella convinced that "a
destruction of the Soviet myth was essential if
we wanted a revival of the Socialist
movement," Orwell began thinking about how
he could best communicate his opinions on
socialism and Stalin.
 Inspiration
• His thoughts were ignited when he happened
to see a village boy whipping a cart-horse. At
that moment, Orwell received the inspiration
he needed to formulate his ideas into Animal
Farm: "It struck me that if only such animals
became aware of their strength we would
have no power over them, and that men
exploit animals" as the government in a
totalitarian state exploits the common people.
 Aim behind composition
• The novel asks its readers to examine the ways
in which political leaders with seemingly noble
and altruistic motives can betray the very
ideals in which they ostensibly believe, as well
as the ways in which certain members of a
nation can elect themselves to positions of
great power and abuse their fellow citizens, all
under the guise of assisting them.
 Historical events
• The concept of Animalism developed by Old
Major, a figure akin to Marx and Lenin
• The end of Jones’ reign paralleled by the
Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 when the Russians
after defeat in I WW, hunger, starvation and
poverty forced the Czar to abdicate
• The USSR flag depicted a hammer and a sickle,
tools of the workers, the flag of Animal Farm
depicted a horn and a hoof
• Stalin believed in armament, Trotsky believed in
encouraging worker’s revolution in other nations just as
Napoleon believes in armament while Snowball in
propagation of the ideals of revolution
• Stalin rears a private army- the KGB, the Gestapo of Hitler
like Napoleon rears the pups to become ferocious dogs
• Squealer stands for Russian propagandist newspapers
especially Pravda
• Old Major’s skull is displayed like Lenin’s remains were
displayed publicly
• Conferment of rewards and honors also has parallels with
Stalin creating honors for himself
• The Battle of the Cowshed represents the Civil War which
broke out almost immediately after the Revolution
• Frederick represents Adolf Hitler (1889–1945), who forged
an alliance with Stalin in 1939 — but who then found
himself fighting Stalin's army in 1941.
• The confessions and executions of the animals reflect the
various purges and "show trials" that Stalin conducted to
rid himself of any possible threat of dissention.
• Mr. Whymper is a man hired by Napoleon to represent
Animal Farm in human society. He is loosely based on
George Bernard Shaw who visited the U.S.S.R. in 1931 and
praised what he found. Shaw advocated Fabianism, a kind
of socialism
• The revolt of the Hens reflects the revolt of the peasants against
Collective Farming
• The sale of timber refers to the non-aggression pact signed
between USSR and Germany at the beginning of WW II.
• The Battle of the Windmill reflects the U.S.S.R.'s involvement in
World War II — specifically the Battle of Stalingrad in 1943, when
Stalin's forces defeated Hitler's (as Napoleon's defeat Frederick).
• The card game at the novel's end parallels the Tehran Conference
(November 28–December 1, 1943), where Stalin, Winston Churchill,
and Franklin D. Roosevelt met to discuss the ways to forge a lasting
peace after the war
• Cheating at the card game reflects duplicity in the nature of the
pigs, the animals, the various nations while signing peace treaties
• •The ousting of the humans after the farmers forget to feed the animals is an
allusion to the Russian Revolution of 1917 that led to the removal of the Czar after
a series of social upheavals and wars and ultimately resulted in famine and
poverty.
• •The refusal of the Humans to refer to Animal Farm by its new name (still calling it
Manor Farm) may be indicative of the diplomatic limbo in which the Soviets
existed following their early history.
• •Mr. Jones' last ditch effort to re-take the farm (The Battle of the Cowshed) is
analogous to the Russian Civil War in which the western capitalist governments
sent soldiers to try to remove the Bolsheviks from power.
• •Napoleon's removal of Snowball is like Stalin’s removal of Leon Trotsky from
power in 1927 and his subsequent expulsion and murder in Mexico.
• •Squealer constantly changing the commandments may refer to the constant line
of adjustments to the Communist theory by the people in power. Also, his lies to
animals of past events they cannot remember refers to the revision of history texts
to glorify Stalin during his regime.
• •After Old Major dies, his skull is placed on display on a tree stump. Similarly,
Lenin's embalmed body was put on display in Lenin's Tomb in Red Square
postmortem, where it still remains. It should also be noted that the tomb of Karl
Marx is adorned by an extremely huge bust of his likeness which lends more
credibility to Old Major being a closer reference to Karl Marx than to Lenin. Marx's
tomb is located in Highgate Cemetery, London.
• •When Napoleon steals Snowball’s idea for a windmill, the windmill can be
considered a symbol of the Soviet Five-Year Plans, a concept developed by Trotsky
and adopted by Stalin, who, after banning Trotsky from the Soviet Union, claimed
them to be his idea. The failure of the windmill to generate the expected creature
comforts and subsequent search for saboteurs is probably a reference to
accusations and a show trial against British engineers who were working on
electrification projects in the USSR.
• •Moses the raven leaving the farm for a while and then returning is similar to the
Russian Orthodox Church going underground and then being brought back to give
the workers hope.
• •Boxer's motto, "Napoleon is always right" is strikingly similar to "Mussolini is
always right," a chant used to hail Benito Mussolini during his rule of Italy from
1922 to 1943.
• •During the rise of Napoleon, he ordered the collection of all the hens' eggs. In an
act of defiance, the hens destroyed their eggs rather than give them to Napoleon.
During Stalin's collectivization period in the early 1930s, many Ukrainian peasants
burned their crops and farms rather than handing them over to the government.
• •Napoleon's mass executions, of which many were unfair for the alleged crimes, is
similar to Stalin executing his political enemies for various crimes after they were
tortured and forced to falsify confessions.
• •The four pigs that defy Napoleon's will are comparable with the purged party
members during the Great Purge — Bukharin, Rykov, Zinoviev, Kamenev and many
others.
• •Napoleon replaces the farm anthem "Beasts of England" with an inane
composition by the pig poet Minimus ("Animal Farm, Animal Farm / Never through
me / Shall thou come to harm"). In 1943, Stalin replaced the old national anthem
"the Internationale" with "the Hymn of the Soviet Union." The old Internationale
glorified the revolution and "the people." The original version of the Hymn of the
Soviet Union glorified Stalin so heavily that after his death in 1953, entire sections
of the anthem had to be replaced or removed. Orwell could have also been
referring to Napoleon Bonaparte's banning of the French national hymn, La
Marseillaise in 1799.
• •Napoleon works with Mr. Frederick, who eventually betrays Animal Farm and destroys the
windmill. Though Animal Farm repels the human attack, many animals are wounded and
killed. This is similar to Stalin’s Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact with Nazi Germany in 1939, which
was later betrayed in 1941 when Hitler invaded the Soviet Union. Though the Soviet Union
won the war, it came at a tremendous price of roughly 8.5-15 million Soviet soldiers
(unconfirmed) and many civilians, resulting in an incredible estimated 20 million dead, as well
as the utter destruction of the Western Soviet Union and its prized collective farms that Stalin
had created in the 1930s. The detonation of the windmill and the battle that ensued there
could also be a reference to the Battle of Stalingrad. The selling of the farm's excess timber
supply could represent the offering of raw materials to the United States in exchange for
weapons of war under the Lend-Lease.

• •Napoleon changing Animal Farm back to Manor echoes the Red Army’s name change from
the "Workers' and Peasants' Red Army" to the "Soviet Army" to appear as a more appealing
and professional organization rather than an army of the common people.
• •Squealer may be an allegory of the Soviet Newspaper in which Stalin often wrote many of
the articles anonymously to give the impression the country was far better off than it was.
• •The dogs may be an allegory to the NKVD (KGB), the elite police force who ruled by terror
under Stalin's hand.
• •Boxer, in the allegory of the novel, directly relates to the working class who laboured under
strenuous and exceedingly difficult conditions throughout the Communist regime with the
hope that their work would result in a more prosperous life. Boxer represents this clearly at
points when he utters such quotes as "I will work harder" in response to any sort of difficulty.
In the context of the story, this also allows Boxer to become a tool of propaganda to be used
by Napoleon and his regime later on once Boxer has been murdered to pay for a crate of
whisky for the pigs.
• •When Napoleon and Snowball argue about how Animal Farm should be ruled--Napoleon
favored the harvest, Snowball favored getting other farms (countries) to rebel. This is similar
to Stalin wanting "Socialism in one country" and Trotsky's theory of "Permanent Revolution.“
 themes
• Allegory is a figurative mode of representation conveying meaning
other than the literal. Allegory communicates its message by means
of symbolic figures, actions or symbolic representation
• Satire where Orwell attacks the prominent follies of his time
• Rising stature of leaders and shortening value of ideals and theories
• Political corruption
• Abuse of power through manipulation of language
• Indifference, vested interests of general public- Mollie, Benjamin,
Boxer
• Religion is opium- Moses
• Deception and self-deception
 Orwell’s Technique
• Allegory/Fable
• Narration of historical events
• Anonymous Narrator
• Writer’s perspective
• Plot
• Dialogue
• Protagonist/antagonist
• Ironical that Orwell was a socialist