Book reviewWaseem SaleemAnimal farm by George Orwell
‘Animal Farm’ is one of the shortest English novels, written by the most prominent author George Orwell. Fundamentally, this novel is based on the political scenario of Europe from the nineteenth to the twentieth century. But, he has specified the whole process remarkably. He takes an animal farm as a country and makes some animals as politicians of that country.
In the novel, Mr. Jones has an animal farm where various kinds of animals live including dogs, pigs, horses, cats, goats, donkeys, etc. However, these animals do not like their administrator Jones and they had been unhappy with him for years, because of his harsh and unfavorable behavior. The animals do not acquire nutrition in time and their farmhouse ceiling is willing to lay down upon them. Still, Jones does not do anything for them.
Though there is an overweight pig whose name is Old Major. Major has a super sharp brain that gives birth to new ideas, thinks differently from others, and dreams of some changes in the farmhouse for his other fellows. Then he gets underway mobilizing other animals through his thoughtful statements that our leader has not been doing far enough for us. And that they should stand against him and combat with him for their rights. Without us, it says, Jones is zero. And that they ought to build their own government. “For how many years do we live like this? We are all in a manmade lockup,” tells major.
Similarly, they all stand jointly and kick off Mr. Jones from the farmhouse. And then, the kingship of the farmhouse goes on the hands of all animals.
After misplacing due to battle, Jones carries some of his friends and wants to keep his power again on the farmhouse. But his plan stops working.
Then the animals decide to assign their contemporary leader to the farmhouse. Then two pigs take steps and stand for the election. One is snowball who is a very intelligent, peace-lover and hard-working politician who wants some improvement for his other friends. On the other hand, Napoleon is a very strong and clever manipulator of the minds of animals and talks about equity and equality, and progressiveness. Then the animals see Napoleon as God's messenger. Then Napoleon wins the election and becomes the new leader through his friend Square's dissemination of information.
When Napoleon comes into power, he presents a charter like other politicians. There are seven rules in his charter but the last rule is extraordinary which is, “All animals are equals.” Because of that the animals believe more in him rather than anyone else. But very soon after becoming a leader, he forgets his several promises and spends most of his time drinking and enjoying. On the opposite, all the rest of the animals do work day and night for him. He does not provide them with even food either.
After passing days, he executed the idea of Snowball. He orders them to build a wind turbine to create electricity for the relaxation of work in the farmhouse. So, poor animals build a wind turbines.
Meanwhile, there is a farmer, whose name is Frederic. It attacks the farmhouse with his colleagues and wants to capture it. But all animals fight back against Frederic and win the battle. But his associates destroy the wind turbine and wound a horse, namely Boxer.
Boxer is among those animals which does a lot of work to build that wind turbine. Then Napoleon takes him to the doctor but Napoleon, on the way, slaughters Boxer and lies in front of others that Boxer dies on his own.
Furthermore, he changes the ‘charter’ and writes: “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”
Now the condition of animals become worse than in the period of Mr. Jones. Napoleon goes outside of the farmhouse and drinks and goes to the clubs for his enjoyment. It also starts businesses with those men who he used to taunt. Besides all these, Napoleon himself spends a lavish lifestyle but the rest of the animals then live in an animal-made lockup with more dissatisfaction.
At the end of the book, the writer draws a map of the book that Napoleon does fulfill all his enjoyment and pleasures but, on the other hand, the rest of the animals are left to die as they have no food to eat and their healthy get deteriorated due to many diseases.
Based on my personal observations to understand the actual meaning of the book, I point out some things which are the following.
The old Major, I felt, is Karl Marx who creates awareness among the people about their rights and responsibilities. Snowball is an intelligent politician and genuinely wants to work for the people. But he lost the election because he does not know how to lie. He also represents a loyal political work in society.
Napoleon is a dirty-minded politician, is clever, liar who plays with the minds of people, and does brainwash them with false commitments and announcement.
Squarnor is a spreader of false information among the people. He is a close ally of Napoleon. Such kinds of people are available in every totalitarian regime. He represents those people who always say the government is doing great and don't raise their fingers at the government's evils.
Boxer is a hard-working common man who bears all kinds of difficulties for the nation but at the end gets nothing. Boxers could be a farmer, watchmen, daily wage earners, etc.
The theme of the book that I draw is based on the following things. Idealism is one among them. As Old Major shows all animals their rights.
Besides this, corruption too was showed in the short novel. The politicians say that they give everything but end up with nothing. As Napoleon said during his political campaign that there will be free land for all and everyone is equal and everyone will be treated equally. But in reality, he did nothing for the animals which is called corruption.
Deception too was glimpsed in the novel. The politicians do commitments for betterment but when they come into power, they do nothing. It means they only do it for their own interests, not for the poor masses. Before the election, they promise to solve all kinds of evils but after winning the elections, they leave the ship in the storms.
Last one was exploitation. The politicians just exploit the ordinary men. They are not loyal to the nation as the common men are.
