s.penkevich's Reviews > Animal Farm

I suspect this is what my pets are getting up to while I’m away. ‘All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others,’ is something I’m fairly certain my dog has barked while stealing a treat from the other dog, and cats are inherently libertarians so there’s probably some horrible revolution brewing. Come to think of it, when my cat pukes on the rug it does sound vaguely like he’s saying‘the only good human being is a dead one,’ but I won’t hide the Orwell from them because there will be no censorship in this house. Anyways, Animal Farm is a classic for a reason and it is one that I found managed to hit even harder as an adult than it did when I read it for my freshman literature class. This story was used to teach us all the term allegory, as in “Orwell wrote Animal Farm as an allegory of the Russian Revolution” as well as the term satire, as in “Orwell satirizes following political leaders into totalitarianism,” but above all it taught me how a good writer can deliver an important political message even adorned in the trappings of a barnyard tussle. While it is highly critical of the Soviets, readers shouldn't mistake it as a condemnation of socialism as Orwell was more intent on showing how those who thirst for power will hijack socialist movements and Orwell wants to protect those in order for them to flourish. Animal Farm remains a staple of western literature and classroom discussions for Orwell’s ability to be succinct and accessible while also conveying complex themes on freedom, power struggles and one of Orwell’s signature themes: propaganda.

Sandra Boynton’sBarnyard Dance…Orwell style

Having just recently read and been blown away by Watership Down from Richard Adams where themes of leadership and power are examined through a story of the animal kingdom, I wanted to revisit Orwell and see how his similar allegorical packaging held up. While Adams’s tale is fairly symbolic of WWII, I think it functions really great as a general metaphor on authoritarianism and struggles for freedom whereas Orwell’s Animal Farm is much more confined within its narrative as a take on the Soviet Union. Not that it can’t be read as a more general look at the way well-intentioned movements can be corrupted by power and those in power can propagate the people into paving their paths to power, but a lot of Animal Farms charm is seeing the satirical allegory and the character references. For instance, we can see how Old Major is representative of Karl Marx and his dream a nod to the The Communist Manifesto, or Napoleon representing Joseph Stalin, Snowball as Leon Trotsky, and more metaphorical stand-ins such as the working class personified as Boxer. Though perhaps it is Squealer who is my favorite of the political metaphors on propaganda and rhetorical manipulations for all the books snappy slogans, but more on that in a moment,

‘All men are enemies. All animals are comrades.’

The opening of the story reflects the overthrow of the Czar and while Orwell is speaking out against the communist regime that took control, Orwell is often misinterpreted as being broadly anti-socialism, anti-marxism, etc. In his essay Why I Write (you can read it HERE) he states ‘every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I understand it.’ Which I think adds an important nuance to this story that is often misinterpreted: it isn’t to say that the idea of all animals being equal, or the idea of organizing for a more just society are inherently bad, its that movements often get hijacked to become antithetical to what they started as and rhetoric gets twisted and turned back inwards.

The irony, however, is that for all his work examining the evils of propaganda—a primary theme in 1984—the book Animal Farm itself became weaponized as propaganda. In his introduction to a Ukranian edition, Orwell himself admits he wanted to use distribution of the novel as anti-Soviet rhetoric, because apparently all propaganda is equally bad but some propaganda is more equally bad than others. ‘I have been convinced that the destruction of the Soviet myth was essential if we wanted a revival of the Socialist movement,’ he says, and wrote Animal Farm in a way that ‘could be easily understood by almost anyone and which could be easily translated into other languages.’ Which explains the accessibility of the novel, and while it is fairly heavy-handed it still reads quite well.

The use of the novel as propaganda didn’t just end at distributions of translations, however. In his book Orwell Subverted: The CIA and the Filming of Animal Farm, Daniel J. Leab argues that Animal Farm was intended as a ‘ warning against the Stalinist perversion of socialism’ and not socialism itself, though the CIA found the narrative a useful tool if they could make a few changes. Orwell’s widow was apprehensive of a film adaptation originally and then demanded they maintained the integrity of Orwell’s vision, and one might wonder if her reluctance to give access to any of Orwell’s work after that. The CIA made the anti-Soviet theme more pronounced without any nuance, such as making Snowball completely irredeemable and making a division between “good” and “bad” farmers to make a statement that not all farmers (and by proxy all capitalists) are bad.

‘Can you not understand that liberty is worth more than just ribbons?’

What fascinates me most in this novel is the use of language, particularly the way language can be manipulated or intentionally obfuscated in order to seduce the masses, subvert opposition and reframe reality. Language with oversimplificatiosn like ‘four legs good, two legs bad’ masks ulterior motives and becomes a sort of catch-all to smuggle a whole ideology. As Noam Chomsky wrote in Media Control: The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda:

'That's the whole point of good propaganda. You want to create a slogan that nobody's going to be against, and everybody's going to be for. Nobody knows what it means, because it doesn't mean anything.'

Squealer and Napoleon repeatedly walk back earlier statements, twisting logic as they see fit and Boxer, confused and wanting to remain loyal, is easy propagated to believe any revision. Even to history, such as Snowball’s role in the revolution. This idea is expressed in Orwell’s 1984’ as well, ‘if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought,’ and through Orwell we often see how language is a great tool but one that can also be weaponized for evil.

‘Man is the only creature that consumes without producing. He does not give milk, he does not lay eggs, he is too weak to pull the plough, he cannot run fast enough to catch rabbits. Yet he is lord of all the animals. He sets them to work, he gives back to them the bare minimum that will prevent them from starving, and the rest he keeps for himself. ’

This is a quick read, and a rather fun one at that even if you aren’t reading for the Soviet allegory. It is fairly heavy handed, and intended as such, and while I think I prefer the way Watership Down is more broadly metaphorical and emotional (also has its own lore and language), the directness and accessibility of this one also help it land a major impact upon the reader. It is no surprise this has remained a classroom staple for its ease of teachability on both literary techniques and political history but also from the way the CIA harnessed it as propaganda forever enshrining it in US culture as well as English. Though at heart it is more a warning about power and abuse of rhetoric in order to hijack movements. So watch out, your pets might be collaborating with each other and you should be wary if a meow starts to sound strangely like Vive la révolution...

4.5/5

‘The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.’