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Unit 4: Animal Farm by George Orwell

Notes
Mr. Jones by a democratic coalition of animals quickly gives way to the consolidation of
power among the pigs. Much like the Soviet intelligentsia, the pigs establish themselves
as the ruling class in the new society.
The struggle for pre-eminence between Leon Trotsky and Stalin emerges in the rivalry
between the pigs Snowball and Napoleon. In both the historical and fictional cases, the
idealistic but politically less powerful figure (Trotsky and Snowball) is expelled from the
revolutionary state by the malicious and violent usurper of power (Stalin and Napoleon).
The purges and show trials with which Stalin eliminated his enemies and solidified his
political base find expression in Animal Farm as the false confessions and executions of
animals that Napoleon distrusts following the collapse of the windmill. Stalin’s tyrannical
rule and eventual abandonment of the founding principles of the Russian Revolution are
represented by the pigs’ turn to violent government and the adoption of human traits and
behaviours, the trappings of their original oppressors.
Although Orwell believed strongly in socialist ideals, he felt that the Soviet Union realized
these ideals in a terribly perverse form. His novella creates its most powerful ironies in
the moments in which Orwell depicts the corruption of Animalist ideals by those in
power. For Animal Farm serves not so much to condemn tyranny or despotism as to indict
the horrifying hypocrisy of tyrannies that base themselves on, and owe their initial power
to, ideologies of liberation and equality. The gradual disintegration and perversion of the
Seven Commandments illustrates this hypocrisy with vivid force, as do Squealer’s elaborate
philosophical justifications for the pigs’ blatantly unprincipled actions. Thus, the novella
critiques the violence of the Stalinist regime against the human beings it ruled, and also
points to Soviet communism’s violence against human logic, language, and ideals.
The Societal Tendency toward Class Stratification
Animal Farm offers commentary on the development of class tyranny and the human
tendency to maintain and re-establish class structures even in societies that allegedly
stand for total equality. The novella illustrates how classes that are initially unified in the
face of a common enemy, as the animals are against the humans, may become internally
divided when that enemy is eliminated. The expulsion of Mr. Jones creates a power vacuum,
and it is only so long before the next oppressor assumes totalitarian control. The natural
division between intellectual and physical labour quickly comes to express itself as a new
set of class divisions, with the “brainworkers” (as the pigs claim to be) using their superior
intelligence to manipulate society to their own benefit. Orwell never clarifies in Animal
Farm whether this negative state of affairs constitutes an inherent aspect of society or
merely an outcome contingent on the integrity of a society’s intelligentsia. In either case,
the novella points to the force of this tendency toward class stratification in many
communities and the threat that it poses to democracy and freedom.
The Danger of a Naïve Working Class

One of the novella’s most impressive accomplishments is its portrayal not just of the
figures in power but also of the oppressed people themselves. Animal Farm is not told
from the perspective of any particular character, though occasionally it does slip into
Clover’s consciousness. Rather, the story is told from the perspective of the common
animals as a whole. Gullible, loyal, and hardworking, these animals give Orwell a chance
to sketch how situations of oppression arise not only from the motives and tactics of the
oppressors but also from the naïveté of the oppressed, who are not necessarily in a position
to be better educated or informed. When presented with a dilemma, Boxer prefers not to
puzzle out the implications of various possible actions but instead to repeat to himself,
“Napoleon is always right.” Animal Farm demonstrates how the inability or unwillingness
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