One is Driven to the Cynical Thought that Men are Decent Only When They are Powerless - Research Paper Example

 George Orwell’s Animal Farm, written in the late 1940s, has always been considered as a satire on the Russian Revolution, though Orwell did not like the capitalists using it as a book against Stalin. Written as a fable, Animal Farm follows all the characters and events in the revolution very meticulously, bringing out the idea that totalitarianism is the greatest political evil. Orwell shows how one becomes corrupt when power is in one’s hands and how corruption leads to multiple corruptions as was the case with Stalin. The theme of this paper is a comparative study of the events and the characters in Animal Farm and the Russian Revolution in order to highlight the book’s parallelism to the revolution. To understand the parallelism in a clear perspective it is imperative first to have a brief look at why George Orwell wrote Animal Farm. The powerful message emerging from the novel is that, as Sonia Orwell and Ian Angus write, “one is driven to the cynical thought that men are decent only when they are powerless” (Sonia and Ian, 372). Whatever Orwell seriously wrote since 1936 were in one way or other connected with his dislike of totalitarianism. He believes that totalitarianism is totalitarianism, be it by the proponents of communism, or fascism, or capitalism. Orwell was a socialist. “Orwell remained a confirmed socialist and worked almost exclusively for socialist journals”, says Robert Weaver (Weaver). In order to achieve the totalitarian goal, those in power resort to various kinds of propaganda, and it is the false propaganda which lead to miseries and unhappiness, believes Orwell. He reconstructs the events of Russian Revolution in his novel by using animals as his characters, and as a parable Animal Farm has secured a firm place in literature. Each important character needs a close examination here to bring out the parallelism clearly. Each character and idea given in Animal Farm serves as a metaphor for the persons and ideas in the Russian evolution. The animal spirit behind the revolution in the novel is animalism which stands for communism. This spirit originates from Old Major, a pig, which was happy to have completed a long life. Before he dies he imparts what he gained as experience and knowledge from his long association with human beings to his fellow animals. The essence of his advice is “remember always your duty of enmity towards Man and all his ways. Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy. Whatever goes on four legs, or has wings, is a friend” (Orwell). Old major is a metaphor for Karl Marx and Lenin. He creates the ideas needed for animalism and with his powerful vocabulary he injects the spirit of animalism into other animals. This is how the novel begins. Before the revolution the animals had been living in Manor Farm owned by Mr. Jones. When Old Major dies his ardent disciples, Napoleon and Snowball, come forward to lead the animals for a revolution after waiting for an appropriate chance. Jones is overthrown and the name of Manor Farm is changed into Animal Farm. Snowball represents Leo Trotsky and Napoleon stands for Joseph Stalin. Napoleon is selfish, shrewd, and cowardly. His selfishness finally leads to the totalitarian regime in Animal Farm. Snowball, on the other hand, is more intelligent, and is original. His fate is that of Trotsky, as he is exiled from the farm by Napoleon. With these two pig leaders, paralleling the situations in Russia, Orwell weaves marvelous situations in the novel to parody the way totalitarianism was established in Russia. As Donald E. Polgin remarks, “The metaphor of a farm revolution goes wrong when certain of the pigs manipulate the democratic process” (Donald, 191). Napoleon manipulates the process in Animal Farm in order to consolidate power and it leads to the totalitarianism in the farm. A major event in the novel at the beginning is the Battle of Cowshed. It represents the battle of the Tsarist forces against the Bolsheviks. It is in this battle the contrast between the two leaders, Napoleon and Snowball becomes sharp. Every animal knows that Snowball fought well, but the removal of Snowball from the farm is quite essential for Napoleon who symbolizes Stalin. Here comes the importance of propaganda. The thrust of the novel is on the role of propaganda in perpetuating totalitarianism. In fact, the most attractive character in the novel is Squealer, a symbol of Russian newspaper, Pravda. In carrying out his works in a meticulous way, be it writing on the wall, or suitably (mis)interpreting what is written on the wall to his illiterate fellow animals, or in giving rhetoric speeches, he is par excellent. Without this medium Napoleon would certainly fail in securing his totalitarian regime. Writing everything in a beautiful and artistic way is essential to make sure that propaganda never fails. For this all totalitarian regimes take over the control of art. In Animal Farm it is done by a character named Minimus. The common man simply follows the leader hoping that the life will be better, and he works hard. Boxer in the novel represents the proletariat. A very strong and hard working horse, without whom the windmill would have not been possible, Boxer finally dies in a butcher’s shop, thus bringing out Stalin’s, here Napoleon’s, brutal and hard-hearted nature. Orwell was a socialist but he was utterly disappointed with the political developments in Russia. He writes in “The Freedom of the Press” that “For quite a decade past I have believed that the existing Russian régime is a mainly evil thing, and I claim the right to say so, in spite of the fact that we are allies with the USSR in a war which I want to see won” (Freedom). Therefore, Orwell has very carefully portrayed Napoleon and Squealer to show how the revolution finally reaches to a state of total injustice and cruelty. Orwell has introduced various kinds of animals and birds in the novel, all occupying appropriate place in the story and supporting the overall structure of the parable. Clover representing the female working class, Mollie symbolizing the selfish and materialistic middle class, the dogs as metaphor for the KGB, the sheep as the common citizens, and the human characters in the names of Frederick and Pilkington are very integral to the story, making the novel a pleasant reading. He has taken care not to lose his grip on the characters and never forgets that though they are animals they are parodying very difficult political moods. He has also taken liberty as an artist to make necessary twists from the actual original historic chronology. In his “Preface” to the Ukrainian edition Orwell writes: “although the various episodes are taken from the actual history of the Russian Revolution, they are dealt with schematically and their chronological order is changed; this was necessary for the symmetry of the story…. A number of readers may finish the book with the impression that it ends in the complete reconciliation of the pigs and the humans. That was not my intention” (Preface). The novel begins with the hope that the animals after the revolution will be better than man. But it ends by giving the confusion: “The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but it was already impossible to say which was which” (Animal Farm). There is hardly any difference between fascism and communism, if they become totalitarian. Russian Revolution based on the noble principle of Marxism had given hope, but Stalin, like Napoleon in the story, Stalin proved that fascism and communism are the two sides of the same coin, totalitarianism. The way Stalin went after technology to improve materialism in Russia is symbolized in the novel in the episode of constructing the windmill. Instead of establishing a welfare state, Stalin exploited the workers as Napoleon exploits the animals in the name of the windmill. Susan McHugh writes, “In Orwell’s Animal Farm the never-completed windmill, the symbol of a technological utopia, fails to deliver the animals from exploitation as workers, and instead becomes the means by which the pigs take the human role of working the animals to death” (Susan). The novel also shows that the “mindworking” class becomes superior to the working class. As reflected in this paper, the revolution in the novel, Animal Farm, is a parody of the Russian Revolution, bringing out the message that both the means and the end of any movement must be noble. As pointed out by Anna Hasappi, the novel “tells a good story that aims to prove that human nature and diversity prevent people from being equal and happy, or at least equally happy” (Anna). Like the common animals in the story, or the helpless proliterate in Russia, one hardly knows why a revolution is called for or why a war is fought, but easily succumbs to the propaganda each “mindworking” class propagates. Orwell through his work enables the readers to be enlightened against such selfish totalitarian adventures. Art in the hands of writers like Orwell becomes a useful tool. William J. Long says, “All art is the expression of life…, it is the expression of some truth and beauty…, but which remain unnoticed until brought to notice by some sensitive human soul” (Long, 2). Animal Farm is a fine artistic work which enlightens the readers morally and socially. Reference Hasappi, Anna. “Animal Farm: George Orwell”, Book Reviews, http://bookreviews.nabou.com/reviews/animalfarm.html Long, William J. English Literature: Its History and Its Significance, Delhi: Surjeet Publications, 2007. McHugh, Susan. “Animal Farm’s Lessons for Literary (and) Animal Studies, Humanimania: A Journal of human/animal interface studies, Vol. 1, No. 1, Sept 2009. Orwell, George. Animal Farm. http://www.george-orwell.org/Animal_Farm/0.html “The Freedom of the Press”. http://home.iprimus.com.au/korob/Orwell.html “Preface to the Ukraine Edition”. http://home.iprimus.com.au/korob/Orwell.html Polgin, Donald. E. “Orwell’s Preface to Animal Farm”, Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism. Spring, 1988. Orwell, Sonia and Ian Angus, Eds. The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell, Vol.1, 1971. Weaver, Robert. “Orwell's Preface to Animal Farm” http://home.iprimus.com.au/korob/Orwell.html Read More