Chrystal Sanchez

Claim: Although the animals seem to be lead away from their Master, Snowball and Napoleon rise to control the
animals in their own way revealing their totalitarianism act.
Glover, Beaird. "Animal Farm." Masterplots, Fourth Edition (2010): 1-3. Literary Reference Center. Web. 22
Feb. 2016.
No Page: The name Snowball recalls Trotskys white hair and beard, and possibly, too, that he crumbled under
Stalins opposition. The event in which Snowball is chased away from the farm is similar to the expulsion of
Trotsky from Russia in 1929. The book is written with such sophistication and subtlety, however, that a reader
unaware of Russian history might very well see it as an animal story only. Moreover, reading the book strictly to
find reference to Russian history misses an important point: Orwell said the book is intended as a satire on
dictatorship in general. The name of the ruling pig, Napoleon, is a reminder that there have been dictators
outside Russia. Not Stalin in particular, but totalitarianism is the enemy Orwell exposes.
No Page: The problem Orwell addresses is how to combine power with ideals. How do the oppressed who rise
above their oppressors manage to keep from becoming like the oppressors? With this book, Orwell gives an
instance of the slave coming to resemble the master after overthrowing him. There is not a happy ending. From
the beginning of the story, the dogs are against the rats, thus foreshadowing an animal government in which
social justice will not be acquired.
Brockington, Jr., William S. "Animal Farm." Masterplots II: Juvenile & Young Adult Fiction Series (1991): 1-2.
Literary Reference Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Orwell meant for his novel to show not only that utopian dreams are unrealistic but also that those
who blindly accept them will be manipulated and controlled by cynics willing to betray the dream.
No Page: Indeed, at the end of the novel, Animal Farm is renamed Manor Farm, and the practices that meant so
much during the early revolutionary period have been abolished. A dictatorship has been established; the dream
is dead.
Sapakie, Polly. "Freud's Notion Of The Uncanny In ANIMAL FARM." Explicator 69.1 (2011): 10-12. Literary
Reference Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
Page 11: As the pigs gain power, unrepentantly perverting the aims of the rebellion, they use language as a
weapon, an uncannily subtle manner in which to control the animals. The pigs do more than talk, though, by
manipulating the reality of Animal/Manor Farm to the degree that the animals are confounded, sensing that
what once was is now misshapen into an unrecognizable incarnation of the initial rebellion.
May, Charles E. "Animal Farm." Masterplots II: British & Commonwealth Fiction Series (1987): 1-3. Literary
Reference Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Yet the means by which it levels this criticism at Communism that is, in terms of a relatively
simple and two-dimensional beast fable does little to illuminate either the virtues or the vices of that complex
ideology.
No Page: The central irony of the fable is that although the animals initially rebel against the humans because of
behavior which humans usually call beastly, the animals themselves, as the work progresses, become more
and more like humans that is, more and more base and beastly.

Welsh, James M. "Animal Farm." MagillS Guide To Science Fiction & Fantasy Literature (1996): 1-2. Literary
Reference Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: This animal fable is a political allegory of the Russian Revolution. The allegory, as various critics
have demonstrated, has exact counterparts to the events and leaders of the Bolshevik Revolution, the October
Revolution, and the development of the Soviet Union into a dictatorship under the control of Joseph Stalin.
No Page: The animals are led by the teachings of old Major, whose historical counterpart is Karl Marx.
Snowball, the theoretician, represents Leon Trotsky, and it is Snowball who organizes the rebellion against
Farmer Jones, who represents capitalism. Another swine, Napoleon, representing Joseph Stalin, discredits
Snowball with the help of his propagandist, Squealer. Napoleon organizes a counterrevolution with the help of
his guard dogs (the state police or palace guards, in terms of the allegory) and drives Snowball into exile (as
happened with Trotsky), then plays one neighbor, Frederick (Hitler), against the other, Pilkington (a
Churchillian Tory), paralleling the events of World War II.
No Page: Ultimately, the democratic principles of Animalism as defined by old Major are redefined as the
totalitarian principles of Napoleon, and the Seven Commandments are changed to accommodate Napoleons
reign of terror, particularly the two words added at the end of one central commandment to make it read, No
animal shall kill another animal without cause.
Grofman, Bernard. "Pig and Proletariat: Animal Farm as History." San Jose Studies 16.2 (Spring 1990): 5-39.
Rpt. in Short Story Criticism. Ed. Joseph Palmisano. Vol. 68. Detroit: Gale, 2004. Literature Resource Center.
Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: In the process I hope to demonstrate that Animal Farm works at several levels, as a charming story
about "humanized" animals, as an allegory about the human condition, and, most importantly, as a thinly
disguised and biting political satire about Soviet totalitarianism. No reader can fully enjoy the book without
knowing, for example, that the pig Snowball represents Trotsky and the pig Napoleon represents Stalin.
Brown, Spencer. "Mealymouthed Critics Ignore Animal Farm's Anticommunist Flavor." Readings on Animal
Farm. Ed. Terry O'Neill. San Diego, Calif.: Greenhaven Press, 1998. 70-81. Rpt. in Short Story Criticism. Ed.
Joseph Palmisano. Vol. 68. Detroit: Gale, 2004. Literature Resource Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: The drunken farmer Jones flees from his mistreated and aroused animals, who, following the
teachings of the late boar Major, set up an egalitarian commonwealth and attempt to run the farm by and for
themselves. Few of them, unfortunately, are intelligent enough to do anything but heavy labor, and the direction
of things gradually devolves upon the pigs, who lead a successful defense against Jones's armed intervention. A
struggle for power develops between the two leading pigs, Napoleon (Stalin) and Snowball (Trotsky).
Napoleon, by means of his Chekist (GPU, NKVD, MVD) dogs, exiles Snowball, seizes absolute power, and
sets about building a windmill (the Dnieper Dam, symbol of Russia's industrialization) originally planned by
Snowball.
No Page: "The main point about Animal Farm," says Archer Winsten in the New York Post, "is that it has
something to say about dictatorships, democracy, and the conflicts between those who toil and those who rule.
No Page: Like Orwell's fable, the film is a vitriolic satire on dictatorship, uncomfortably realistic in the
comparison of man to the lower form of animal and a frightening example of the oppressed masses under
tyrannical rulers drunk with power.
No Page: Those who unmention Russia are asking us to believe that so sophisticated an anti-Communist as
George Orwell wrote a book in which by mere accident every event and every character can be shown to
correspond exactly to some fact, general or particular, of Soviet history. Moreover, it is clear that the demagogy

in Animal Farm can only be the demagogy of a dictatorship whose origin was egalitarian and pacifist socialism:
Comrade Napoleon--when was it ever Comrade Hitler or Comrade Mussolini? The Nazis and Fascists
specifically condemned equality and socialism and denounced democracy as corrupt. Only the Communists
claimed to be more democratic than anyone else; only to the Communists could one satirically attribute such a
slogan as "All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others."
Snodgrass, Mary Ellen. "Animal Farm." Encyclopedia of Fable. Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-Clio, Inc., 1998.
34-39. Rpt. in Children's Literature Review. Ed. Tom Burns. Vol. 132. Detroit: Gale, 2008. Literature Resource
Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Having taught themselves to read and write, the pigs seize the initiative. In place of Jones, now a
porcine troika supervises labor, challenges other animals to surpass productivity under human management, and
retains for the supervisory elite the fruits of Animal Farm's first harvest. Eventually, Snowball condenses the
Seven Commandments to a single precept: "Four legs good, two legs bad." (Orwell 1946, 41) Moreover, by
keeping the other animals overworked and in a perpetual state of tension and anticipation, the pigs conceal their
duplicity while plotting the next stage of the power play. The episode suggests that gullibility is often a prologue
to victimization.
No Page: In retaliation, a miniature Russian proletariat arises to oust Jones, his family, and workers. Selfgoverning for the first time in animal history, the pigs, eager to create the perfect farm, make a public display of
burning whips, blinkers, nosebags, reins, and halters, all evidence of human oppression. In a public show of
piety and state ceremony, they reconfirm their unity by conducting a ritual burial for Jones's hams.
No Page: To manage the willy-nilly barnyard disorder, Orwell creates one of fable's enduring humanesque
animals: Napoleon, a fierce, secretive, taciturn Berkshire boar of 24 stone who sets ambition over principle.
Cunningly self-serving, he deceives his rival, the ingenuous Snowball, and, as a control over minor defections,
trains nine puppies into a parody of a jackbooted hit squad. To the question of Sunday morning meetings he
responds by barring future such incidents of wasted time and empanels a puppet committee of pigs, headed by
himself.
No Page: Lacking concrete plans for Animal Farm, Napoleon achieves political aims by subverting Snowball's
authority and by seizing psychological control through militant posturing, intimidation, and brainwashing. A
fable in itself, this sequence mirrors the ominous motifs of classic Aesopic lore, which characteristically
anticipates torture, maiming, exile, and death as appropriate punishments of the unwary.
No Page: With the assistance of his human cohort, Mr. Pilkington, Napoleon strengthens control over the land,
which he renames Manor Farm. The pigs, in imitation of Jones, walk on their hind legs. The other animals, still
in Napoleon's power, perceive that the tyrannical police force has developed human habits.
Woodhouse, C. M. "Animal Farm." Times Literary Supplement (6 Aug. 1954): xxx-xxxi. Rpt. in Short Story
Criticism. Ed. Joseph Palmisano. Vol. 68. Detroit: Gale, 2004. Literature Resource Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: It tells how the animals captured the Manor Farm from its drunken incompetent farmer; how they
changed its name to Animal Farm and established it as a model community in which all animals were equal;
how two pigs, Napoleon and Snowball, gained control of the revolution and fought each other for the mastery;
how the neighbouring humans reacted and counter-attacked and were beaten off; how Napoleon ousted
Snowball and declared him a traitor; how economic necessity compelled the animals to compromise with the
human system; how Napoleon negotiated an alliance with the human enemy and exploited it to establish his
personal dictatorship; how the farm learned that "some animals are more equal than others" and their last state
was as bad as their first; and how the ruling pigs became daily more and more indistinguishable from their
human neighbours.

Protherough, Robert. "George Orwell: Overview." Twentieth-Century Young Adult Writers. Ed. Laura Standley
Berger. Detroit: St. James Press, 1994. Twentieth-Century Writers Series. Literature Resource Center. Web. 22
Feb. 2016.
No Page: Animal Farm is a brief, simple fable about the animals of Manor Farm who unite in rebellion against
the cruelties and exploitation of the farmer, Mr. Jones, drive out him and his men, and set about running the
farm themselves. Inspired by the example of Boxer, the hard-working horse, they survive difficulties and make
the experiment in equality and cooperation prosper. However, as the years pass, the pigs, cleverest of the
animals, gradually assume more and more power as a new elite under their leader Napoleon. The revolutionary
ideals of equality are replaced by a new hierarchy, and the slogan "All animals are equal" is extended by the
clause, often quoted since, "but some animals are more equal than others."
No Page: Particularly at its time of publication Animal Farm was seen by many readers as an anti-Communist
tract, in which Snowball represented Trotsky and Napoleon was Stalin. Certainly this satirical fable about the
nature of totalitarian societies was rooted in Orwell's experiences in Spain and his awareness of Bolshevik
methods, but it can be read too simply as an allegory of the Russian revolution. Squealer represents any
propagandist and, significantly, the book has been banned in countries of very different political persuasions.
Greenblatt, Stephen J. "George Orwell." Three Modern Satirists: Waugh, Orwell, and Huxley. Stephen J.
Greenblatt. Yale University Press, 1965. 35-74. Rpt. in Novels for Students. Ed. Diane Telgen and Kevin Hile.
Vol. 3. Detroit: Gale, 1998. Literature Resource Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: The moment events compelled him to turn his critical eye on the myth of socialism and the
dictatorship of the proletariat, he discerned fundamental lies and corruption. Orwell, in his last years, was a
man who experienced daily the disintegration of the beliefs of a lifetime, who watched in horror while his entire
life work was robbed of meaning.
No Page: Animal Farm does indeed contain much gaiety and humor, but even in the most comic moments there
is a disturbing element of cruelty or fear that taints the reader' s hearty laughter. While Snowball, one of the
leaders of the revolution of farm animals against their master, is organizing the Egg Production Committee for
the hens, the Clean Tails League for the cows, the Wild Comrades' Re-education Committee..., the Whiter Wool
Movement for the sheep, Napoleon, the sinister pig tyrant, is carefully educating the dogs for his own evil
purposes. Similarly, the confessions forced from the animals in Napoleon's great purges are very funny, but
when the dogs tear the throats out of the guilty parties and leave a pile of corpses at the tyrant's feet, the scene
ceases to amuse.
No Page: Animal Farm has been interpreted most frequently as a clever satire on the betrayal of the Russian
Revolution and the rise of Stalin. Richard Rees comments [in George Orwell: Fugitive from the Camp of
Victory, 1961] that the struggle of the farm animals, having driven out their human exploiter, to create a free
and equal community takes the form of a most ingeniously worked-out recapitulation of the history of Soviet
Russia from 1917 up to the Teheran Conference.
No Page: The control of the revolution falls naturally upon the pigs, particularly upon Napoleon, a large, rather
fierce-looking Berkshire boar, not much of a talker, but with a reputation for getting his own way, and on
Snowball, a more vivacious pig than Napoleon, quicker in speech and more inventive, but ... not considered to
have the same depth of character. Under their clever leadership and with the help of the indefatigable cart
horses Boxer and Clover, the animals manage to repulse the attacks of their rapacious human neighbors, Mr.
Pilkington and Mr. Frederick. With the farm secured from invasion and the Seven Commandments of
Animalism painted on the end wall of the big barn, the revolution seems complete; but as the community
develops, it is plain that there are graver dangers than invasion.

No Page: After all, the pigs do not turn into alien monsters; they come to resemble those bitter rivals Mr.
Pilkington and Mr. Frederick, who represent the Nazis and the Capitalists. All three major powers are
despicable tyrannies, and the failure of the revolution is not seen in terms of ideology at all, but as a realization
of Lord Acton's thesis, Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely. The initial spark of a
revolution, the original intention of a constitution may have been an ideal of the good life, but the result is
always the same tyranny. Communism is no more or less evil than Fascism or Capitalism they are all
illusions which are inevitably used by the pigs as a means of satisfying their greed and their lust for power.
No Page: There have been, are, and always will be pigs in every society, Orwell states, and they will always
grab power. Even more cruel is the conclusion that everyone in the society, wittingly or unwittingly, contributes
to the pigs' tyranny. Boxer, the noblest (though not the wisest) animal on the farm, devotes his unceasing labor
to the pigs, who, as has been noted, send him to the knacker when he has outlived his usefulness.
Times Literary Supplement. "Untitled." Times Literary Supplement (25 Aug. 1945): 401. Rpt. in Short Story
Criticism. Ed. Joseph Palmisano. Vol. 68. Detroit: Gale, 2004. Literature Resource Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: The animals are naturally pleased with themselves when they rise in revolutionary fervour and chase
the drunken farmer off his own land, and their enthusiasm survives the prospect of the labour and discipline that
lie before them if the farm is to be properly worked. From the first, however, there are inequalities of brain and
muscle, and the pigs gradually assume the intellectual leadership. The revolution changes its shape and form,
but lip-service is still paid to its first precepts; if they become more and more difficult to reconcile with the
dictatorial policies of the large Berkshire boar, Napoleon, such a loyal and simple creature as Boxer, the
carthorse, is ready to blame his own stupidity rather than the will to power working in those who have the
means to power in their trotters.
No Page: Even more powerful than Napoleon is Squealer, Napoleon's publicity agent, who justifies every
reactionary decree by arguing that it is really in the animals' own interest and persuades them that to add to the
seventh commandment of the revolution, "All animals are equal," the rider "but some animals are more equal
than others," is not to tamper with the principle of equality. Dictatorship is evil, argues Mr. Orwell with a
pleasant blend of irony and logic while busily telling his fairy story, not only in that it corrupts the characters of
those who dictate, but in that it destroys the intelligence and understanding of those dictated to until there is no
truth anywhere and fear and bewilderment open the way for tyranny ferocious and undisguised.
Gottlieb, Erika. "Harold Bloom, ed. Bloom's Notes. George Orwell's Animal Farm." Utopian Studies 14.2
(2003): 141+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Written between 1943 and 44 and published in 1945, Animal Farm is a political satire of the Soviet
Union, addressed to the leftist intellectual in the West, who uncritically accepted the "Soviet myth," that is, the
myth that Stalin's regime of totalitarian dictatorship was, in effect, a socialist regime. In explaining his point.
Orwell, who fought against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism most of his life, pointed out that his
"whole point is the effect of the Russian mythos on the Socialist movement here. One cannot possibly build up a
healthy Socialist movement if one is obliged to condone no matter what crime when the USSR commits it"
(v.3,443).
Robb, Paul H. "Animal Farm: Overview." Reference Guide to English Literature. Ed. D. L. Kirkpatrick. 2nd ed.
Chicago: St. James Press, 1991. Literature Resource Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Very soon comes the discrediting of co-leader Snowball. Snowball is the idealist, constantly wanting
to consider the welfare of all the animals while Napoleon is the pragmatist, ready to be brutal to achieve his
purposes. So the technique of the ``big lie'' and contrived evidence results in Snowball's being driven out of
Animal Farm, leaving Napoleon in sole command. And the discredited Snowball is blamed whenever problems
arise. Orwell is paralleling the conflict in Russia between Trotsky and Stalin with Stalin the winner.

No Page: Another recognizable technique: revision of the past. The Seven Commandments``unalterable
law''are revised one by one to suit Napoleon's purposes. Also the democratic meetings are changed to
assemblies where Napoleon issues his orders. The workers are often puzzled but they absorb everything they are
told and thus become perfect subjects for manipulation.
No Page: Hypocrisies are numerous, for special privileges for the pigs are decreed and then justified through
Squealer's Doublespeak. And revisions of the Seven Commandments are continually made to suit Napoleon's
personal wishes. The final cynical attitude of all tyrannies is expressed in the ultimate distillation of the Seven
Commandments into one: ``All Animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.''
Shelden, Michael. "Animal Story." Orwell. New York: HarperCollins, 1991. 357-373. Rpt. in Children's
Literature Review. Ed. Lawrence J. Trudeau. Vol. 196. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale, 2015. Literature Resource
Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Animal Farm affirms the values of Orwells ideal version of socialism, making it clear that before the
barnyard revolt was subjected to the treachery of the pigs, the animals were happy as they had never conceived
it possible to be. But he also makes it clear that there is no future for socialist revolutions if they look to the
Soviet model for inspiration or spawn Soviet-style leaders. The book provides a powerful illustration of the
consequences that must follow if such leaders are accepted. The animals allow themselves to become easy prey
for Napoleon, who relentlessly accumulates power by playing on the weaknesses of his comrades.
No Page: Some of the best thrusts of satire are directed against the earnest activities of Snowball, the pig
counterpart of Trotsky. As his name suggests, it is not enough for Snowball to let the revolution develop
according to its own momentum. He must speed it along and increase its efficiency by organizing Animal
Committees, such as the Clean Tails League for the cows and the Wild Comrades Re-education Committee, the
object of which is to tame rats and rabbits. Snowballs absurd officiousness is brilliantly captured when he
mounts the ladder with some difficulty (for it is not easy for a pig to balance himself on a ladder) and writes
the seven commandments of the revolution on the barn, using a brush between the two knuckles of his trotter.
Rodden, John. "Appreciating Animal Farm in the new millennium." Modern Age 45.1 (2003): 67+. Literature
Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Secondly, Animal Farm is an allegory written in the form of a beast fable, in which the misadventures
of animals expose human follies. Orwell draws on our cultural stereotypes of animals: Pigs have a bad name for
selfishness and gluttony. Horses are slow-witted, strong, gentle, and loyal. Sheep are brainless and behave as a
flock without individual initiative. Orwell's point of departure for the fable was a statement from Karl Marx's
Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844: "The worker in his human functions no longer feels himself
to be anything but animal. What is animal becomes human and what is human becomes animal."
No Page: Parts of Orwell's "code" are easy to "crack." For instance, the pigs represent the Communist Party.
The pig leader Napoleon and his rival Snowball symbolize the dictator Stalin and the Communist leader Leon
Trotsky. Old Major is a composite of Karl Marx and Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, the major theorist and the key
revolutionary leader of Communism, respectively. "Beasts of England" is a parody of the Internationale, the
Communist Party hymn.
No Page: Some humans are like pigs, others resemble sheep, still others can be compared to dogs, and so forth.
On this level, Orwell's "fable" about human nature transcends both history and particular political events. We
see how the fundamental characters of animals do not change. The animals behave consistently, whether in a
noble or selfish spirit, through all the changes in the story from the feudal, aristocratic, conservative farm run by
Mr. Jones to the modern, progressive, radical "animal farm" ruled by Napoleon.

Rossi, John P. "The enduring relevance of George Orwell." Contemporary Review 283.1652 (2003): 172+.
Literature Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four, both partially about how the idea of revolution is betrayed,
also deal with the corruption of language and the fading of historical truth. In recent months there has been
renewed criticism of Orwell from some left-wing circles in Britain because he had provided a list of pro-Soviet
intellectuals to the British security services. Orwell did this because of his fear that a Soviet victory in the Cold
War could lead to a totalitarian dictatorship.
Leavens, Dennis. "Finding One to Worship, Finding One to Betray: The Language of Fable in Thurber, Orwell,
and Pynchon." Bestia 3 (May 1991): 74-86. Rpt. in Short Story Criticism. Ed. Jelena O. Krstovic. Vol. 137.
Detroit: Gale, 2010. Literature Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
No Page: In George Orwell's Animal Farm, the beast fable is extended to a book-length narrative, a politicaleconomic-social satire on, ostensibly, communist and socialist revolutions, which are really--who ever thought
otherwise?--totalitarian power plays in drag.
Rossi, John. "Orwell on fascism." Modern Age 54.1-4 (2012): 207+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb.
2016.
No Page: While Orwell's anticommunism dates back to the mid-1930s, especially his experience during the
Spanish Civil War, he was at first less insightful about the other great totalitarian movement of that "low,
dishonest decade," fascism.
No Page: Orwell's critique of communism is both incisive and original. He was among the first writers to
recognize that communism was not a revolutionary force but instead was a new, dangerous form of
totalitarianism, a powerful tool for controlling the masses. Conversely, his initial comments on fascism were
curiously flat and imitative of the standard left-wing interpretation--that is, fascism was nothing more than the
capitalist system in extremis.
Saunders, Loraine. "Orwell: The Proletarian Novelist." The Unsung Artistry of George Orwell. Aldershot:
Ashgate, 2008. 9-26. Rpt. in Children's Literature Review. Ed. Lawrence J. Trudeau. Vol. 196. Farmington
Hills, MI: Gale, 2015. Literature Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
No Page: In Animal Farm it is through illuminating the staggering hubris of the controlling pigs, only to see
them brought low through their cowardice, ignorance or plain stupidity that Orwell bathetically pokes most fun
at their faux superiority. Again, we see what the animals do not see. The scene some days after The Battle of the
Windmill, caused by the discovery that the rival farmer Frederick had paid for their timber with forged notes,
has a particularly neat comic twist; and it is Orwells play with the Stalin-figure, Napoleon, that is expertly
bathetic. Orwell sets up Napoleon for his most egregious fall in the scene prior to the discovery of the forged
notes, where, in a ridiculous ceremony, Napoleon has the animals file past him to witness his procurement of
this glorious money.
Cowper, Richard. "George Orwell: Overview." St. James Guide to Science Fiction Writers. Ed. Jay P. Pederson.
4th ed. New York: St. James Press, 1996. Literature Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
No Page: George Orwell's worldwide reputation as a writer of science fiction rests upon a single novel,
Nineteen Eighty-Four. Such is the dynamic force of this work that the title of the book has become a universal
symbol for the totalitarian nightmare.
Byrne, Katharine. "Not all books are created equal: Orwell & his animals at fifty." Commonweal 123.10 (1996):
14+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016

No Page: But then, inexorably, methodically, equality and freedom are stripped away as the pigs, under
Napoleon, a ruler as brutal as Jones was, develop a ruling elite that abrogates all privilege to itself at the
expense of the "lower" animals.
"Napoleon." Merriam Webster's Encyclopedia of Literature. Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster, 1995.
Literature Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Napoleon Fictional character, a pig who usurps power and becomes dictator over the other animals in
Animal Farm, by George Orwell.
"Snowball." Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia Of Literature (1995): N.PAG. Literary Reference Center. Web. 23
Feb. 2016.
No Page: Snowball Fictional character, a pig who is one of the leaders of the revolt in ANIMAL FARM, George
Orwell's allegorical tale about the early history of Soviet Russia. Most critics agree that Snowball represents
Leon Trotsky, the revolutionary leader who struggled against Joseph Stalin after the Russian Revolution and
lost.After the farm animals revolt and drive the farmer and his family off the land, Snowball organizes the
animals into committees and tries to educate them in self-government. The farmer attempts to recapture his farm
but is repulsed by animals led by Snowball, whom the animals decorate as Animal Hero, First Class. Under
Snowball's leadership, the animals build a windmill for electric power. He is overthrown and expelled in a coup
mounted by Napoleon, a pig who becomes absolute dictator of the animals.
Franks, Carol. "George Orwell." MagillS Survey Of World Literature, Revised Edition (2009): 1-8. Literary
Reference Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
No Page: To Orwell, oppression seems inevitable insofar as people are deceived by, and deceive others with,
political language that is, with discourse aimed at deception rather than expression. In Animal Farm, for
example, the animals reject the totalitarian rule of the cruel humans and try to erect a democratic socialism, only
to become victims of new tyrants, the pigs and dogs. The oppressed animals are repeatedly deceived by clever
political language and, thereby, allow themselves to be victimized. In the end, it matters little to the oppressed
animals whether their oppressors are humans, hogs, or dogs.
No Page: In this power struggle, essentially between the two young boars Snowball and Napoleon, one sees at
first a sort of idealism, especially in Snowball, who speaks of a system that sounds much like Orwells
particular vision of democratic Socialism. The animals begin by renaming Manor Farm as Animal Farm and
by putting into print their seven commandments, designed primarily to identify their tenets and to discourage
human vices among themselves. At first, the new order almost appears to work: Nobody stole, nobody
grumbled. . . . Nobody shirked or almost nobody. In fact, Orwells animals have human weaknesses that
lead to their destruction.
No Page: Though Animal Farm is antitotalitarian, it cannot really be called prodemocratic Socialism, except in
the sense of a warning, because the animals have no choice; the course of their fate appears inevitable. Even if
they had been given a choice, little in the novel indicates that it would have mattered.
Valiunas, Algis. "Orwell in the Orwellian century." Claremont Review of Books Fall 2014: 52+. Literature
Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
No Page: The unforgivable intellectual sin was to accept the Soviet masters' own proclamation that the Socialist
Motherland was a light unto the nations, while in fact it had become one of the darkest places on the earth.