Kelechi Anyanwu

Claim: Napoleon and Squealer-The Pigs- are always in charge and display totalitarianism in their actions.
"Notes & Comments: September 2015." New Criterion 34.1 (2015): 1-3. Literary Reference Center. Web. 22
Feb. 2016.
Page 1: Political liberty, however, is a fragile achievement, ever beset by the claims of privilege, undermined by
enthusiasts of all persuasions. It is also difficult to discuss candidly, for even describing its usurpations seems
provocative to partisans on the other side, who see no abridgement of liberty but merely business as usual if not,
indeed, the extension of their ideas of virtuous order. The trouble is that it is much easier to lose than to forge
political liberty. The price of its maintenance is constant vigilance. The price of its recapture when once lost is
generally a far messier business.
Page 2: As the years passed, however, many tilings changed at Animal Farm. A couple of the more pacific
animals noticed that the pigs had taken to walking on their hind legs and that those who were supervising the
work of the farm all carried whips in their trotters. It was at about that time that the seven commandments
mysteriously disappeared and were replaced with just one: All animals are equal, but some are more equal than
others.
Franks, Carol. "Animal Farm." MagillS Survey Of World Literature, Revised Edition (2009): 1-2. Literary
Reference Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: The final decay of Animal Farm results from the pigs engaging in all the human evils about which old
Major had forewarned them. The pigs become psychologically and even physically indistinguishable from the
humans. The pigs wear clothing, sleep in beds, drink alcohol, walk on two legs, wage wars, engage in trade, and
destroy their own kind. Ultimately, despite old Majors vision, nothing has changed. The pigs and their dogs
have become bureaucrats and tyrants: neither pigs nor dogs produced any food by their own labour.
No Page: Under Napoleons rule, Animal Farm declines steadily. As the pigs break the commandments, they
rewrite them to conform to the new order. The sheep bleat foolish slogans on Napoleons behalf. Napoleons
emissary, Squealer, a persuasive political speaker, convinces the increasingly oppressed animals that nothing
has changed, that the commandments are as they always were, that history remains as it always was, that they
are not doing more work and reaping fewer benefits.
No Page: Squealer, in his distortion of history and his abuse of language for political purposes, is a precursor of
Winston Smith and the other employees in the Ministry of Truth in Nineteen Eighty-Four who spend their days
rewriting history and stripping the English language of its meaning. Ironically, all the animals pour their energy
into creating a system that leads to their oppression.
No Page: Boxer, a horse, believes blindly in the work ethic and the wisdom of Napoleon.
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. The final image in the
novel is of the oppressed creatures outside the house looking through the window at the pigs and men fighting
over a card game. They looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already
it was impossible to say which was which.
Hays, Carl. "Project Animal Farm: An Accidental Journey Into The Secret World Of Farming And The Truth
About Our Food." Booklist 111.21 (2015): 13. Literary Reference Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.

Page 13: Following the lead of other sharp critiques of the food industry, such as David Kirbys Animal Factory
(2010), Michael Pollans The Omnivores Dilemma (2006), and Jonathan Safran Foers Eating Animals (2009),
newbie author Faruqi does a commendable job spotlighting the ways animals are mistreated around the globe in
order to make their milk and flesh available in our stores.
Meyers, Jeffrey, and Northrop Frye. "Chapter 10: ANIMAL FARM: Part 67: Northrop Frye, Canadian Forum."
George Orwell (0-415-15923-7) (1997): 206-208. Literary Reference Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
Page 206: At each stage of this receding revolution one of the seven principles of the original rebellion becomes
corrupted, so that no animal shall kill any other animal has added to it the words without cause when there is
a great slaughter of the so-called sympathizers of an exiled pig named Snowball, and no animal shall sleep in a
bed takes on with sheets when the pigs move into the human farmhouse and monopolize its luxuries.
Eventually there is only one principle left, modified to all animals are equal, but some are more equal than
others, as Animal Farm, its name changed back to Manor Farm, is welcomed into the community of human
farms again after its neighbors have realized that it makes its lower animals work harder on less food than any
other farm, so that the model workers republic becomes a model of exploited labor.
Page 207: Animal Farm adopts one of the classical formulas of satire, the corruption of principle by expediency,
of which Swifts Tale of a Tub is the greatest example. It is an account of the bogging down of Utopian
aspirations in the quicksand of human nature which could have been written by a contemporary of Artemus
Ward1 about one of the co-operative communities attempted in America during the last century. But for the
same reason it completely misses the point as a satire on the Russian development of Marxism, and as
expressing the disillusionment which many men of goodwill feel about Russia.
Page 208: A really searching satire on Russian Communism, then, would be more deeply concerned with the
underlying reasons for its transformation from a proletarian dictatorship into a kind of parody of the Catholic
Church. Mr Orwell does not bother with motivation: he makes his Napoleon inscrutably ambitious, and lets it
go at that, and as far as he is concerned some old reactionary bromide like you cant change human nature is as
good a moral as any other for his fable.
Meyers, Jeffrey, and Cyril Connolly. "Chapter 10: ANIMAL FARM: Part 64: C.C. (Cyril Connolly), Horizon."
George Orwell (0-415-15923-7) (1997): 199-201. Literary Reference Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
Page 200: The allegory between the animals and the fate of their revolution (they drive out the human beings
and plan a Utopia entrusted to the leadership of the pigsNapoleon-Stalin, Snowball-Trotskywith the dogs
as police, the sheep as yes-men, the two carthorses, Boxer and Clover, as the noble hard-working proletariat),
and the Russian experiment is beautifully worked out, perhaps the most felicitous moment being when the
animal saboteurs are executed for some of the very crimes of the Russian trials, such as the sheep who
confessed to having urinated in the drinking pool or the goose which kept back six ears of corn and ate them in
the night. The fairy tale ends with the complete victory of Napoleon and the pigs, who rule Animal Farm with a
worse tyranny and a far greater efficiency than its late human owner, the dissolute Mr Jones.
Page 200: Politically one might make to Mr Orwell the same objections as to Mr Koestler for his essay on
Russia in The Yogi and the Commissarboth allow their personal bitterness about the betrayed revolution to
prejudice their attitude to the facts. But it is arguable that every revolution is betrayed because the violence
necessary to achieve it is bound to generate an admiration for violence which leads to the abuse of power. A
revolution is the forcible removal of an obsolete and inefficient ruling-class by a vigorous and efficient one
which replaces it for as long as its vitality will allow. The commandments of the Animal Revolution, such as no
animal shall kill any other animal or all animals are equal can perhaps never be achieved by a revolutionary
seizure of power but only by the spiritual operation of reason or moral philosophy in the animal heart.

Page 201: Animal Farm, a brief barnyard history of the Russian Revolution from October to just beyond the
Stalin-Hitler pact, is the characteristic product of such a mind, both with credit and discredit to its qualities.
Meyers, Jeffrey, and Kingsley Martin. "Chapter 10: ANIMAL FARM: Part 63: Kingsley Martin, New Statesman
And Nation." George Orwell (0-415-15923-7) (1997): 197-199. Literary Reference Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
Page 198: There is plenty in the U.S.S.R. to satirise, and Mr Orwell does it well. How deftly the fairy story of
the animals who, in anticipation of freedom and plenty, revolt against the tyrannical farmer, turns into a
rollicking caricature of the Russian Revolution! His shafts strike home. We all know of the sheep, who drown
discussion by the bleating of slogans; we have all noticed, with a wry smile, the gradual change of Soviet
doctrine under the pretence that it is no change and then that the original doctrine was an anti-Marxist error.
(The best thing in Mr Orwells story is the picture of the puzzled animals examining the Original Principles of
the Revolution, and finding them altered: All animals are equal, said the slogan; to which is added, but some
are more equal than others.)
Page 198: The falsehoods about Trotsky, whose part in the revolutionary period, only secondary to Lenins, has
been gradually erased from the Soviet history books, is another fair count against Stalinite methods. The story
of the loyal horse who worked until his lungs burst and was finally sent off to the knackers yard is told with a
genuine pathos; it represents a true and hateful aspect of every revolutionary struggle. Best of all is the character
of the donkey who says little, but is always sure that the more things change the more they will be the same, that
men will always be oppressed and exploited whether they have revolutions and high ideals or not.
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 10: Though little scholarship exists to link the uncanny to Animal Farm, I suggest the final scenes of the
novel haunt readers because of the uncanny. Included in the final chapter is the striking scene when on a
pleasant evening when the animals had finished work . . . the terrified neighing of a horse sounded from the
yard (Orwell 132). Clovers terror arises because she sees Napoleon walking on his hind legs, carrying a whip
in his trotter. Eerily human-like, the sight of a pig walking on his hind legs obscures the boundaries of reality,
fogging them with fear. This uncanny moment represents the formerly repressed reality of Animal Farm, the
reality the animals have ignoredthe pigs have become oppressors, remade in the image of active evil. This
doubling of Farmer Jones, a distorted version of a being already in existence (Gentile 23), compounds the
terror of the animals.
Page 11: Building on the unspoken fears of the animals, these pigs would be as men and carry the weapons of
man, including the whip that subjugates the animals by its very presence. The gradual development of the pigs
into what they had originally overthrown is by degrees, so the animals can ignore it for a time. However, by the
time four legs are good but two legs even better, it is hard to overlook the metamorphosis of the pigs into
something like humans, aping their predecessors in appearance as well as performance (Morse 88) in order to
preserve their tyranny. Unmitigated by the fact that the animals made bargains all along, usually unspoken, with
the reality of life under the pigs, the uncanny fears of the animals rose to the surface. The animals endured small
indignities that bled into large horrors, all for the putative guarantee of a golden future, never attempting to
speak out until it is too late: It was as though the world had turned upside down . . .[T]here came a moment
when the first shock had worn off [and] they might have uttered some word of protest. But just at that moment,
as though at a signal, all the sheep burst out into a tremendous bleating ofFour legs good, two legs better!
(133)
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. [T]he uncanny is

that class of the frightening which leads back to what is known of old and long familiar (Freud 620), yet it
brings with it a new fear, as when the animals see Napoleon walking as if he were Jones.
Whalen-Bridge, John. "Animal Farm." Cyclopedia Of Literary Characters, Revised Third Edition (1998): 1.
Literary Reference Center. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Napoleon Napoleon, a young boar who ousts Snowball and assumes complete power over the other
animals. While Snowball is studying human science, Napoleon trains a litter of dogs to become his secret police
force. Napoleon corresponds to Joseph Stalin, who ousted Trotsky after the death of Lenin and who then led
bloody purges against possible and imagined dissenters.
Squealer Squealer, also a young boar. Squealer is the most clever with language and is Napoleons
propagandist and chief misinformation officer. He is said to be able to turn black into white, meaning that he
can convince most animals of things that are patently false.
"In A Perfect World." Read 54.6 (2004): 6-7. Literary Reference Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
Page 6: Blair was passionate about horrors that result when iron-fisted governments abuse their authority. Using
the name George Orwell, he wrote about such atrocities in brilliant satires. In the satirical novel 1984 (1949),
Orwell foretold a society under the all-powerful, omniscient "Big Brother." For citizens of this future world,
there is no hiding, no such thing as privacy.
Page 7: Before writing 1984, however, Orwell wrote an animal story. By 1945, Orwell was a well-known writer,
yet he was having a hard time finding a pubhsher for his latest hook, Animal Farm. Why was everyone so riled
up over a simple fairy tale about barnyard animals? That was just it; it wasn't merely a fairy tale. It was a
political fable.
Page 7: When you read the play in this issue, which is based on the book, imagine Napoleon the pig as Joseph
Stalin. Stalin was the cruel ruler of the Soviet Union from 1922 until his death, in 1953. He reveled in his power
and destroyed anyone who got in his way. As one of history's most brutal dictators, he killed millions of his own
people. Some of the animals in Animal Farm question Napoleon's reign of dominance and fear, but most seem
content witb his leadership. Why? How does Napoleon gain powerall at once or bit by bit?
Page 7: Just as his story is a direct comment on past events in the Soviet Union, it is also a general warning to
people everywhere: Beware of leaders who have absolute power. Why did Orwell write Animal Farm as a fairy
tale? Maybe because fairy tales can paint a perfect world. In a perfect world, there would be no horror or
suffering at the hands of a corrupt government. In a perfect world, we would all live in a fairy tale. In a perfect
world ...
Gottlieb, Erika. "Harold Bloom, ed. Bloom's Notes. George Orwell's Animal Farm." Utopian Studies 14.2
(2003): 141+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
Page 141: 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).
Page 142: As for Elizabeth Beaudin's "Structural Analysis", it is a rather over-simplified plot summary of the
animal fable, without any mention of Orwell's masterful political allegory, where each animal represents a
historical character, class, or institution. Avoiding even the slightest mention of the political-historical context

and of Orwell's outstanding achievement in the genre of satire, Bloom's introduction and Beaudin's "Structural
Analysis" offer here even less to the reader than would be expected from an average guide to high school
students.
Page 142: It is also worthwhile to point out that since several of Orwell's critics compare Animal Farm to such
classics as the animal fables of Swift or Lafontaine, the editor could add a few lines to suggest why the book has
a universal significance growing out of, and spreading beyond, its politically specific satirical target. Indeed.
One would expect that the Notes should provide some kind of guidance to the major lines of the critical
controversy in the novel's interpretation.
Ligda, Kenneth. "Orwellian comedy." Twentieth Century Literature 60.4 (2014): 513+. Literature Resource
Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
Page 514: The goose-step, he would later contend, never came to Great Britain "because the people in the street
would laugh. Beyond a certain point, military display is only possible in countries where the common people
dare not laugh at the army" (12.396). (6) In "Politics and the English Language,"
Rossi, John. "Orwell on fascism." Modern Age 54.1-4 (2012): 207+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb.
2016.
Page 208: Orwell's understanding of the other great "ism" of the twentieth century, fascism, took a longer time
to mature than did his unique insights into communism. Orwell never found anything appealing in fascism,
which was an example of an evil political concept that threatened the very nature of democratic society. Unlike
communism, which Orwell detested while recognizing its appeal to certain idealistic types, fascism had no
redeeming value.
Rodden, John. "Appreciating Animal Farm in the new millennium." Modern Age 45.1 (2003): 67+. Literature
Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
Page 67: WITH THE APPROACH of the centennial of George Orwell's birth in June 2003, much attention is
already turning to reassessments of his life and to the ongoing relevance in the new millennium of his
masterwork, Nineteen Eighly-Four (1949). (1) Easily neglected amid the hoopla is the magnificent little beast
fable of totalitarianism which launched Orwell's fame and which he often called his "favorite" book, Animal
Farm (1945). This essay looks at how changing historical conditions have altered the reception of Animal Farm
in the last decade--since the collapse of the U.S.S.R. in December 1991.
Page 68: When Orwell published the British edition of Animal Farm in August 1945, Halmi was a young antiCommunist resistance fighter, battling Stalinism in his native Hungary. "I was hungry...and surrounded by
barbed wires and the so-called Iron Curtain," he recalls, stressing how inspirational Animal Farm was to him
growing up. "We were completely isolated. You thought, 'Nobody knows about us, nobody knows what
communism is, nobody knows what terror is.' And all of a sudden, Animal Farm was published and was
smuggled into Hungary. It became my bible." When Halmi was able to flee Hungary, he took Animal Farm with
him.
Page 69: As his career flourished, he frequently thought about producing AnimalFarm. But a live-action
adaptation remained a seemingly impossible dream. Finally, by the mid-1990s, the science of movie-making
caught up with Halmi's ambition to make pigs talk like commissars. (6)
Page 70: Animal Farm is "more about repression than Stalinism," director John Stephenson has remarked in
defense of his Animal Farm ending. "You can see the characters in any organization, in any human group.
They're typical of the human race." Stephenson added that Animal Farm has "become an anti-dictatorship book.
It applies to Kosovo today as much as it applied to Hungary then."

Page 70: Animal Farm, on the other hand, is an allegory of the history of the Bolshevik Revolution and its
aftermath, with numerous one-to-one correspondences with key events in the U.S.S.R. But that totalitarian
system collapsed almost a decade ago, making its history even more distant to a potential international viewing
audience numbering in the hundreds of millions, including adolescents now encountering Animal Farm who
were not even of school age when the Soviet Union dissolved in December 1991. In light of these facts, a closer
look at the fable's multivalent meaning, political significance, and historical context is warranted in this essay.
Page 71: It is crucial not to approach Animal Farm merely as "great literature" that "transcends" its time and
place, as one might do, say, with some of the poetry of the great modernist writers. Instead we need also to
appreciate the specific historical and ideological conditions of World War II and the early postwar era, for both
shaped Orwell' s conception of Animal Farm and how its original audience received it.
Page 72: First, it is a political allegory of the history of the U.S.S.R.--sometimes jokingly referred to as an
"animallegory." Traditionally, an allegory is a symbolic tale that treats a spiritual subject under the guise of a
worldly one, such as Langland's Piers Plowman and Bunyan's Pilgrim 's Progress. 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."
Page 72: Orwell adapts the literary forms of the allegory and beast fable for his own purposes. "The business of
making people conscious of what is happening outside their own small circle," he once wrote, "is one of the
major problems of our time, and a new literary technique will have to be evolved to meet it." (11) Orwell's
symbolic tale takes a political subject and treats it under the guise of an innocent animal story. But Animal Farm
also has a stinging moral warning against the abuse of power.
Page 72: Like most allegories, Animal Farm operates by framing one-to-one correspondences between the
literal and symbolic levels. Its events and characters function as a simple story on the literal level. But they also
operate on a symbolic level for readers who know the "code." In this case, the key code is the history of Soviet
Communism. Orwell subtitled Animal Farm as "a fairy story," but the subtitle was an ironic joke. He meant that
his beast fable was no mere "fairy story," but that it was happening in Stalin's Russia, and that it could happen
anywhere.
Page 72: 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. The animals' rebellion in
Chapter 2 represents the Russian Revolution of October 1917. The battle of the Cowshed in Chapter 4 depicts
the subsequent civil war. Mr. Jones and the farmers are the loyalist Russians and foreign forces who tried but
failed to dislodge the Bolsheviks, the revolutionaries led by Lenin. The animals' false confessions in Chapter 7
represent the purge trials of the late 1930s.
Page 73: The actual details of the story did not come to me for some time until one day (I was then living in a
small village) I saw a little boy, perhaps ten years old, driving a huge cart-horse along a narrow path whipping it
whenever it tried to turn. It struck me that if only such animals became a ware of their strength, we should have
no power over them, and that men exploit animals in much the same way as the rich exploit the proletariat. I
proceeded to analyze Marx's theory from the animals' point of view. (12) Orwell's last line makes clear the
larger purpose of his story. And it suggests the other levels on which the fable functions.

Page 73: Second, Animal Farm is a political treatise that suggests larger lessons about power, tyranny, and
revolution in general. On this level, Orwell's book has a much broader historical and political message, one that
is not limited to criticism of the Soviet Union
Page 73: by the conclusion of Animal Farm, some of the pigs are walking upright and wearing human clothes:
they are little different from corrupt human beings. Animal Farm mirrors our human world, which is sometimes
referred to as "the human circus" because the various types of human personality can be compared to the
character types of animals. 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.
Page 73: 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.
Page 75: Viewers, as well as readers, will find that Animal Farm captures both the hope and the tragedy of the
Russian Revolution, and that it provides an introduction to a few of the major figures in the history of
Communism. Animal Farm is a fable that offers simple, valuable political lessons. Among them are the
following: power corrupts; revolutions tend to come full circle and devour their peoples; and even good, decent
people not only hunger for power, but also worship powerful leaders.
Gaunt, Richard A. "THE TORIES AND INEQUALITY." Contemporary Review 294.1704 (2012): 100+.
Literature Resource Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
Page 100: 'All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others'. Though the residents of George
Orwell's Animal Farm (1945) may have slowly come to perceive their inequality, the British have never been
much enamoured with egalitarianism--at least not in the last two hundred years. The 'Politics and Philosophy of
Inequality' has been the very marrow of Conservative politics and practice ever since Edmund Burke launched
his assault upon the excesses of the French Revolution in 1790.
"George Orwell." Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6Th Edition (2015): 1. Literary Reference Center. Web.
23 Feb. 2016.
No Page: Orwell was a keen critic of imperialism, fascism, Stalinism, and capitalism, all of which seemed to
him forms of political oppression, and although he espoused a sort of socialism, he refused to be formally
associated with any ideology or party label. His works are concerned with the sociopolitical conditions of his
time, notably with the problem of human freedom.
No Page: Animal Farm (1946) is a witty, satirical fable about the failure of Soviet-style Communism, and
Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) is a prophetic novel describing the dehumanization of humanity in a mechanistic,
totalitarian world.
Byrne, Katharine. "Not All Books Are Created Equal." Commonweal 123.10 (1996): 14. Literary Reference
Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
Page 14: The barnyard is roused to revolution. Led by the pigs, the animals rout Jones and take possession;
"Jones's Manor" is now called "Animal Farm." Morale is high. Victory is sweet for the liberated animals but
also brief. At first they gambol in joy at the prospect of living out their lives in dignity, sharing in the prosperity
their labor produces. Each works hard to sustain the revolution.
Page 14: 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. (The wily pigs explain that they really don't like the milk that they refuse to
share with the other animals; they drink it only to keep up their strength so that they can pursue the welfare of
all.)
Page 16: "all animals are created equal, but some animals are more equal than others." One form of repression
has been replaced by another. In the end, the wretched animals are looking in the window at an economic
summit between Men and Pigs, "Looking from pig to man, and from man to pig they observe that there is no
difference between them."
Page 16: Should Animal Farm be read during the next fifty years? Of course, but for the right reasons: setting
up as it does, with crystal clarity, the price paid when we do not safeguard our freedoms. The hard-working
wretches of the world contribute to their own fate in their ignorant loyalty and apathy. In the book, the huge
cart-horse, Boxer, a faithful, unquestioning worker ("I will get up earlier; I will work harder. . .Napoleon is
always right") is sent to the knackers as soon as his usefulness is over. As he is carried off to his death, the weak
protest of his hooves against the side of the van sounds the dying hope of the animals betrayed.
Page 16: The tendency of power to corrupt must always be recognized; people's hold over their own fate must
prevail: an alert, informed, and wary electorate. Is Animal Farm out of date since the Soviet Socialist Republics,
as constituted, have failed? Only if it is read for the wrong reasons. The tale about independence won but lost
continues to remind us that freedom is fragile and precious. Power corrupts, and there are forces at work
seeking to wield it.
George Orwell Fights The Power. Scholastic Scope 48.1 (n.d.): 12. Literary Reference Center. Web.23 Feb.
2016.
No Page: But power soon fell into the wrong hands. Joseph Stalin, a communist leader, ruled Russia with an
iron fist from 1933 until his death in 1953. He cared more about his power than he did about human life. Back
in England, Orwell read about the events and realized communism wasn't leading to equality for all. During
Stalin's reign, 12 million Russians lost their lives. Many were murdered by government forces; many died from
starvation and overwork. Stalin's government treated workers just as baldly as the royal family had. Sound like
Animal Farm? Orwell wrote Animal Farm as an allegory to describe, in disguise, Stalin's cruelty. In an allegory,
symbolic figures represent real ones. For example, the pig Napoleon shares Stalin's traits. Old Major stands for
the philosopher Karl Marx.
Napoleon. Merriam-Websters Encyclopedia Of Literature (1995): N.PAG. Literary Reference 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's allegorical novel about left-wing totalitarianism. Napoleon is generally
considered to represent Joseph Stalin, the revolutionary leader who gained ascendancy in the Soviet Union
following V.I. Lenin's death and became absolute dictator. Under Napoleon's tyrannical rule, the Seven
Commandments that had inspired the animals' revolution are reduced to but one: All animals are equal, but
some animals are more equal than others.
French, Sean. "When Blunkett Said There Would Be No Selection, He Meant It As A Joke, But Not As A Joke.
Got That?." New Statesman 129.4478 (2000): 28. Literary Reference Center. Web. 23 Feb. 2016.
Page 28: In a similar spirit, I am going to purge myself of references to Animal Farm. I hereby vow never to
refer, in discussing the Labour Party, to the final sentence of the novel in which the creatures "looked from pig
to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was

which". I will never again refer to the PR pig, Squealer, and his habit of saying, when promises are betrayed:
"Surely, comrades, you don't want Jones back?"
Nor in reference to Blunkett's claim that he meant "no more selection" will I ever again refer to the scene after
the first animals have been executed and Muriel reads to Clover the Sixth Commandment, painted on the wall
of the barn:
"`No animal shall kill any other animal without cause.' Somehow or other, the last two words had slipped out of
the animals' memory."