Animal Farm by George Orwell - A book review

Résumé du document

George Orwell wrote "Animal Farm" between November 1943 and February 1944, during the period of the Second World War. He was not the famous author that he is considered today at that time. This might explain why he struggled to get Animal Farm published, whereas it is considered, along with his other world-renowned novel 1984, as one of the masterpieces of the British literature. He died in 1950 and thus never could enjoy the success of his work. "There is no market for children books": that was one of the excuses given by an American editor for not publishing Animal Farm. Of course, it is a book about animals that "speak? and take over a farm and making it theirs, and there are also fights and the end might look like a happy ending, but this would be a great misunderstanding. In fact, the allegoric form is the most important aspect of Orwell's book. Similarly, he can talk about the Bolshevik revolution and its continuation without writing a single name such as Stalin or Lenin. We look at Orwell's work and probe more into its intricacies in this document.

Extraits

[...] First, the pigs infringe multiple times the rules, thus being the Communist Party's Nomenklatura, directing others without applying their own rules for themselves. The dogs, epitome of the Red Army, loyally help them govern, while other animals work hard for accomplishing their dream. The neighboring farmers try to attack the Animal Farm, but the animals win against them. Snowball gets evicted by Napoleon, and the life in the farm keeps on being the same. The novel continues to describe the slow deterioration of an utopist regime which is falling, day by day, a little more apart. [...]

[...] Jones, of the Manor Farm, had locked the hen-houses for the night, but was too drunk to remember to shut the pop-holes.” This is the novel's incipit. This single sentence describes, in an allegoric way as always in this book, Russia's situation before the Revolution. The Czar, who would be Mr. Jones, reigns in a poor way on an Empire, which would be the Manor Farm, trying to do some things to improve his condition, but without success, having no perspective at all, eventually. [...]

[...] Of course, it is a book about speaking animals taking over a farm and making it theirs, there are also fights and the end might look like a happy ending, but this would be a great misunderstanding. In fact, the allegoric form is the most important thing of Orwell's book. That way, he can talk about the Bolshevik revolution and its continuation without writing a single time names such as Stalin or Lenin. It is what this novel is really about, giving his vision of the communist Revolution in what was about to be USSR. [...]

[...] Frederick, one of the neighbors symbolizing Hitler, announcing the beginning of World War II. With this novel, Orwell gives us a real historic analysis, with more finesse then a usual history book, regarding to the fact that the allegory allows him to take some distance with the original facts. Even though an important knowledge about the beginnings of the USSR is needed to read this book, it is a real pleasure to do so, and it gives a new approach to this agitated period. [...]

[...] Among the pigs, Major appears to be a visionary. He explains to the other animals his dream of a world where the animals would not be alienated to the humans. It is not clear whether he epitomizes Lenin or Marx, or other authors of the genuine socialist philosophy. He might be a bit of both, being the great thinker exposing new and revolutionary ideas (therefore Marx), but also giving concrete thoughts, about the upcoming revolution (hence Lenin) such as an anthem, Beasts of England, which could be translated as the International. [...]