Animal Farm, by George Orwell

Animal Farm,  by George Orwell

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Animal Farm is an allegorical and dystopian novel by George Orwell, published in England on 17 August 1945. According to Orwell, the book reflects events leading up to the Russian Revolution of 1917 and then on into the Stalin era in the Soviet Union.[1] Orwell, a democratic socialist,[2] was a critic of Joseph Stalin and hostile to Moscow-directed Stalinism, especially after his experiences with the NKVD and the Spanish Civil War.[3] The Soviet Union, he believed, had become a brutal dictatorship, built upon a cult of personality and enforced by a reign of terror. In a letter to Yvonne Davet, Orwell described Animal Farm as a satirical tale against Stalin “une conte satirique contre Stalin”,[4] and in his essay “Why I Write” (1946), he wrote that Animal Farm was the first book in which he had tried, with full consciousness of what he was doing, “to fuse political purpose and artistic purpose into one whole”.

The original title was Animal Farm: A Fairy Story, though the subtitle was dropped by U.S. publishers for its 1946 publication and subsequently all but one of the translations during Orwell’s lifetime omitted it. Other variations in the title include: A Satire and A Contemporary Satire.[4] Orwell suggested the title Union des républiques socialistes animales for the French translation, which recalled the French name of the Soviet Union, Union des républiques socialistes soviétiques, and which abbreviates to URSA, the Latin for “bear”, a symbol of Russia.[4]

Orwell wrote the book from November 1943–February 1944, when the wartime alliance with the Soviet Union was at its height and Stalin was held in high esteem in Britain among the people and intelligentsia, a fact that Orwell hated.[5] It was initially rejected by a number of British and American publishers, including one of Orwell’s own, Victor Gollancz. Its publication was thus delayed, though it became a great commercial success when it did finally appear partly because the Cold War so quickly followed World War II.[6]

Time magazine chose the book as one of the 100 best English-language novels (1923 to 2005);[7] it also featured at number 31 on the Modern Library List of Best 20th-Century Novels. It won a Retrospective Hugo Award in 1996, and is also included in the Great Books of the Western World selection.

The novel addresses not only the corruption of the revolution by its leaders, but also the ways wickedness, indifference, ignorance, greed, and myopia corrupt the revolution. It portrays corrupt leadership as the flaw in revolution, rather than the act of revolution itself. It also shows how potential ignorance and indifference to problems within a revolution could allow horrors to happen if a smooth transition to a people’s government is not achieved.

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Characters
Pigs

Old Major – An aged prize Middle White boar provides the inspiration that fuels the Rebellion in the book. He is an allegorical combination of Karl Marx, one of the creators of communism, and Lenin, the communist leader of the Russian Revolution and the early Soviet nation, in that he draws up the principles of the revolution. His skull being put on revered public display recalls Lenin, whose embalmed body was put on display.[9][10] Napoleon – “A large, rather fierce-looking Berkshire boar, the only Berkshire on the farm, not much of a talker, but with a reputation for getting his own way”.[11] An allegory of Joseph Stalin,[9] Napoleon is the main villain of Animal Farm. In the first French version of Animal Farm, Napoleon is called César, the French form of Caesar,[4] although another translation has him as Napoléon.[12] Snowball – Napoleon’s rival and original head of the farm after Jones’ overthrow. He is mainly based on Leon Trotsky,[9] but also combines elements from Lenin.[10]
Squealer – A small white fat porker who serves as Napoleon’s right hand pig and minister of propaganda, holding a position similar to that of Molotov.[9] Minimus – A poetic pig who writes the second and third national anthems of Animal Farm after the singing of “Beasts of England” is banned.
The Piglets – Hinted to be the children of Napoleon and are the first generation of animals subjugated to his idea of animal inequality.
The young pigs – Four pigs who complain about Napoleon’s takeover of the farm but are quickly silenced and later executed.
Pinkeye – A minor pig who is mentioned only once; he is the pig that tastes Napoleon’s food to make sure it is not poisoned, in response to rumours about an assassination attempt on Napoleon.

Humans

Mr Jones – The former owner of the farm, Jones is a very heavy drinker. The animals revolt against him after he drinks so much that he does not feed or take care of them. He is an allegory of Russian Tsar Nicholas II,[13] who abdicated following the February Revolution of 1917 and was executed, along with the rest of his family, by the Bolsheviks on 17 July 1918.

Mr Frederick – The tough owner of Pinchfield, a small but well-kept neighbouring farm, who briefly enters into an alliance with Napoleon. He is an allegory of Adolf Hitler,[14][15][16][17] who enters into an alliance with Joseph Stalin only to later break it by invading the Soviet Union.

Mr Pilkington – The easy-going but crafty and well-to-do owner of Foxwood, a large neighbouring farm overgrown with weeds.
Mr Whymper – A man hired by Napoleon for the public relations of Animal Farm to human society. At first he is used to acquire needed goods for the farm such as dog biscuits and paraffin, but later used to procure luxuries like alcohol for the pigs.

Equines

Boxer – Boxer is a loyal, kind, dedicated, and respectable cart-horse, although quite naive and gullible.
Clover – Boxer’s companion, constantly caring for him; she also acts as a matriarch of sorts for the other horses and the other animals in general.
Mollie – Mollie is a self-centred, self-indulgent and vain young white mare who quickly leaves for another farm after the revolution.
Benjamin – Benjamin, a donkey, is one of the oldest animals. He has the worst temper, but is also one of the wisest animals on the farm, and is one of the few who can actually read. He is sceptical and pessimistic, with his most-often-made statement being “Life will go on as it has always gone on—that is, badly.”[18] The academic Morris Dickstein has suggested there is ‘ a touch of Orwell himself in this creature’s timeless scepticism'[19] and indeed, friends called Orwell ‘Donkey George’, ‘after his grumbling donkey Benjamin, in Animal Farm.'[20]

Other animals
Muriel – A wise old goat who is friends with all of the animals on the farm. She, like Benjamin and Snowball, is one of the few animals on the farm who can read.
The Puppies – Offspring of Jessie and Bluebell, taken away from them by Napoleon at birth and reared by Napoleon to be his security force.
Moses – An old raven who occasionally visits the farm, regaling its denizens with tales of a wondrous place beyond the clouds called Sugarcandy Mountain, where he avers that all animals go when they die—but only if they work hard. Orwell portrays religion as ‘the black raven of priestcraft—promising pie in the sky when you die, and faithfully serving whoever happens to be in power. The raven ‘was Mr. Jones’s especial pet, was a spy and a tale-bearer, but he was also a clever talker.’ Napoleon brings the raven back, (Ch. IX) as Stalin brought back the Russian Orthodox Church.[19] The Sheep – They show limited understanding of the situations but nonetheless blindly support Napoleon’s ideals.
The Hens – The hens are among the first to rebel against Napoleon.
The Cows – Their milk is stolen by the pigs, who learn to milk them, and is stirred into the pigs’ mash every day while the other animals are denied such luxuries.
The Cat – Never seen to carry out any work, the cat is absent for long periods, and is forgiven because her excuses are so convincing and she “purred so affectionately that it was impossible not to believe in her good intentions”.[21] She has no interest in the politics of the farm, and the only time she is recorded as having participated in an election, she is found to have actually “voted on both sides”.[21]

Composition and publication
Origin

George Orwell wrote the manuscript in 1943 and 1944 subsequent to his experiences during the Spanish Civil War, which he described in Homage to Catalonia (1938). In the preface of a 1947 Ukrainian edition of Animal Farm, he explained how escaping the communist purges in Spain taught him “how easily totalitarian propaganda can control the opinion of enlightened people in democratic countries”. This motivated Orwell to expose and strongly condemn what he saw as the Stalinist corruption of the original socialist ideals.[22]

Immediately prior to his writing, Orwell had quit the BBC. He was also upset about a booklet for propagandists the Ministry of Information had put out. The booklet included instructions on how to quell ideological fears of the Soviet Union, such as directions to claim that the Red Terror was a figment of Nazi imagination.[23]

In the preface, Orwell also described the source of the idea of setting the book on a farm:[22]

…I saw a little boy, perhaps ten years old, driving a huge carthorse along a narrow path, whipping it whenever it tried to turn. It struck me that if only such animals became aware of their strength we should have no power over them, and that men exploit animals in much the same way as the rich exploit the proletariat.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_Farm