George Orwell’s Attack of Social Institutions in Animal Farm Essay

George Orwell’s Attack of Social Institutions in Animal Farm’Animal Farm’ is a novel from the 1950’s. It was written as a reactionto the major social and political changes occurring in Europe andthroughout the world in the first half of the twentieth century. Thegreatest of these was communism, which was a revolutionary brand ofsocialism that had taken hold in Russia. Orwell agreed with theprinciples of Communism, which promoted equality and the removal ofsocial classes. However, he recognised that it would not work inpractice, as it had not in Russia under Stalin, because of humannature.

The novel details the history of Communism in Russia, from therevolution to the height of Stalin’s regime, through a parallelfiction about a farm where the animals rise up and take over. Throughthis allegory, Orwell can criticise several social institutions thatare relevant to most societies. He comments on the nature ofleadership, hierarchies of social class and methods of controlling thepeople. Characters in the novel become symbolic, representing manyideas and figures from history.

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Orwell is critical of all types of leadership in the novel. FarmerJones owns the farm before the revolution. He is weak and a drunkardwho lets the farm deteriorate and neglects the animals in his charge.They are not fed properly and in the first paragraph of the novel welearn he is too drunk to lock up the poultry for the night henceputting their lives in danger.

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The farm before the revolution is symbolic of a state that is governedautocratically, or by a monarch. Such leaders achieve their positionby inheritance rather…

…ame as the humans at the end. However, All these things come to passbecause the animals are passive and allow themselves to be manipulatedby Squealer and Napoleon. They never challenge what they are told andwhen they do and are severely punished they never rise up againsttheir new oppressor. Orwell is showing that the workers never actuallyrecognise their collective strength and use it. The animals need to beled. Consequently they are at the mercy of whoever is strong enough todominate and govern.

This is probably the most pessimistic message of the novel and themost troubling for the reader. Can we ever control our own lives or ishuman nature too flawed to allow utopia to exist? Orwell seems to besuggesting that we have to accept this situation as history has shownwe make the same mistakes time and again.

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