MS51 808
Animal Farm by George Owell
Animal Farm by George Owell is an allegorical and dystopian book written to depict the idea of the Russian Revolution. Throughout this story we find out that each individual animal leads a
different role in the Russian Revolution such as the horses being the middle class workers, Squealers
the pig being the media. Animals wouldn't only represent these people but they would also represent
bigger and more known characters such as Snowball the pig represented Leo Trotsky who was oneof
the original revolutionaries. Throughout the story of this book we find how fair or unfair this book seems from both perspectives humans and animals. One of the main characters Mr. Frederick represents Hitler the leader of Germany at the time who attacks Manor Farm several times to try to regain territory even though the animals still won.
As the story carries on and we discover more and more animals such as an important line said by the sheep, "four legs good, 2 legs bad!" we would find that this would represent sort of an "army" or a large amount of people. The animals in this story believed that they shouldn't be mistreated and that they should run their own farm and not be forced around. What unfolds after this is the animals take over the farm and rebuild the farm such as building a mill and working together to get food, water and all their supplementary needs. As time goes on more and more issues begin to appear such as Mr. Frederick than one day decides to attack Manor Farm to try to re take it. This represents how Hitler wanted to capture everything and sort of expand out and grow bigger, the animals would represent Jews being mistreated having several examples present. A quote that showed this was the following, "Moreover, terrible stories were leaking out from Pinchfield about the cruelties that Frederick practiced upon his animals. He had flogged an old horse to death, he starved his cows, he had killed a dog by throwing it into the furnace, he amused himself in the evenings by making cocks fight with splinters of razor-blade tied to their spurs. The animals' blood boiled with rage when they heard of these things being done to their comrades, and sometimes they clamoured to be allowed to go out in a body and attack Pinchfield Farm, drive out the humans, and set the animals free." In Animal Farm, the overthrow of the human oppressor Mr. Jones by a democratic coalition of animals quickly gives way to the consolidation of power among the pigs. Much like the Soviet intelligence, the pigs establish themselves as the ruling class in the new society. In the beginning of the book we found that the dogs acted as military/police officers by protecting everyone and sort of making decisions. They voted against the rabbits and rats being known as "comrades" after the revolution they than stole pups from another dog. Jesse and Bluebell are the mothers of the pup and serve as Napoleons body guards. So as an assumption the animals serve as the Jews in Animal Farm trying to live a free life without issues while Mr. Frederick representing Hitler is denying their rights and is trying to manipulate them to giving him the farm. After the revolution drinking alcohol was banned because it was a sign of abused power but the pigs decided to keep drinking.
In conclusion, as you've noticed Animal Farm has many analogies that can be analyzed very easily according to the time of the Russian Revolution. This book represents the struggles that Jews faced against Hitler and how they tried their best to survive and fight against them. Not only does it show that but it shows how power hungry others can be. This wasn't there only attempt to try to fix problems, they would constantly be trying to make acts or peace treaties to try to fix their issues which were shown in the book such as the giving of wood to Mr. Frederick. Even though they tried nothing ever worked but they were able to hold back Mr. Frederick and his troops.
