Jonathan Ramdass 4P

The Animal Farm by George Orwell is an allegorical story, which utilizes its
characters and situational irony to highlight the inherent flaws within a communist
system of governance. Two main characters in this play, the pigs Snowball and
Napoleon are the main tools of reference with which the author uses to expose the
mess that is communist governance. In this essay, the characters Snowball and
Napoleon will be analyzed along with the ways in which they highlight the innate
faults within a communist system of governance.
Napoleon is one of the pigs who took leadership over the farm after the animal’s
rebellion. Initially he is caring and shows determination to an equal animal society
however, he soon lets the power go to his head and becomes an evil tyrant. He
trains fierce guard dogs who threaten anyone who opposes him, he takes all of the
animal’s hard earned food for himself as seen when he takes all the apples and
milk, he becomes so power hungry and tyrannical that he banishes his own partner
Snowball in order to have more power and control. Napoleon even changes some
of the key founding principles for his own advantage in his lust for power, he
changes “All animals are equal” to “All animals are equal but some are more equal
than others” Blatantly disregarding Old Major’s original ideas of a peaceful animal
society for his own gain. Napoleon clearly highlights the flaws within communism
as the author uses him to allude to the communist leader, Joseph Stalin. Napoleon
indirectly shows how evil, greedy and power hungry leaders can be under a
communist regime and how unfair it is for no one to be able to oppose this leader
and have their own say in their society. He also shows the horrific impact
communism has on its own citizens as the animals are put through famine and
extremely difficult working conditions.

Snowball is also one of the pigs who took control after Jones had been overthrown.
Unlike Napoleon, Snowball was intelligent and lively, often devising plans to
make their society a better place. Snowball worked hard for better education
among the animals, teaching many how to read and he formulated a plan, which
would automate farming so the animals had less work to do. Snowball was a kind
and honest character who put others before himself as seen when he bravely fought
in the “Battle of the Cowshed”. However, Napoleon did not like sharing power
neither did he like Snowball’s idea of automating a farm, giving the animals less
work and giving Napoleon less control over them. Therefore, Napoleon chased
Snowball away with his vicious guard dogs and banished him from the farm. From
that moment forward, Napoleon used Snowball’s name as a reason for anything
going wrong. Even when Napoleon himself was causing a massive famine and
hardship, he would always tell the animals to blame Snowball for taking their food
and causing the whole situation. Snowball represented Leon Trotsky and he was
used to highlight how unfair and harsh a communist system of governance can be.
He was used to show that even if you had solutions to make society a better place,
even if you wanted to help all the other citizens, those who were leaders and power
hungry and greedy did not care about making the quality of life better, all they
cared about was control and power.
Animal Farm uses a third person, satirical and allegorical narrative technique.
Orwell uses satire to compare the major leaders to a bunch of pigs whom he then
uses to highlight the massive flaws in their methods and provoke humor from the
audience with the pigs’ stupid actions. He also tells the entire story as an allegory
to the Russian Revolution and its major events, with each character and major plot
event comparable to the events and characters in the Russian Revolution.
In conclusion, George Orwell uses a satirical and allegorical narrative technique in
order to use the characters of Snowball and Napoleon to highlight the inherent
flaws within a communist system of governance.