From the Lists: #31 Animal Farm

When I initially perused the list of 100 Best English Novels of the 20th Century, I highlighted the books I had previously read. This being one of them. When I completed The Golden Bowl, I was in great need for something a more modern and less introspective (i.e.- an easy read). Therefore I thought why not? Since I originally read this book as teenager, who knows what I will think of it from the other side of my lifeline. I am happy I gave it another go.

George Orwell's Animal Farm (1946) is an allegorical story satirizing the Russian Revolution and the rise of Stalinism. The story begins with the animals complaining of their treatment by humans who use the animals' labor only to enrich themselves. This discontent eventually leads to a revolution against Mr Jones, who owns the farm. Once he and his hired hands are chased off the farm, the animals, led by a prize boar named Napoleon, set up a communal society where ostensibly all animals are equal and will share equally in the work and the harvest. As the years go by, the pigs assume more and more power, segregating themselves from the other animals, ruling by decree, blaming outside forces for bad harvests, and executing all who dissent. By the end of the story, the pigs, like Mr Jones, are enriching themselves by exploiting the labor of the other animals - so much so that they begin taking on the characteristics and behaviors of humans.

Orwell had some difficulty getting this short novel published in the UK and the USA. Mainly because no one wanted to upset our former allies in the fight against Hitler. As the cold war heated up immediately following World War II, there was more of an appetite for this type of satire.

Although written specifically as a satire about the USSR, Animal Farm could just as easily be applied to any of the existing dictatorships around the world. I often thought of North Korea with its food and fuel shortages and impotent saber rattling at the rest of the world. Other dictators who popped to mind: Gaddafi, Hussein, Ahmadinejad,  and Chavez - all cults of personality and bellicosity.

Oddly, I also thought of the extremes of capitalism. We are often told that our free-market economy is the best economic model for ensuring that everyone has an opportunity to make a living and share in the wealth. However, the final scene in the novel, where the pigs are feasting while the underfed animals (under paid workers) peer in through the windows, seemed to hit very close to home. As we all work harder and harder to keep jobs that we are grateful to have, the rich exhort us to work harder to further increase profits. And, like the animals on the farm, very little of those profits go to reward the worker. Instead, they go to enrich the CEO, the board of directors, and share holders who are all feeding at the trough, just like Napoleon and his cadre of pigs.

Don't get me wrong, I love my country and the opportunities it provides. I do, however, find myself looking around and wondering what happened? How did we get to a place where the rules can be changed to benefit one group or business over all others and no one notices? Why are people not paying attention to what our governments and businesses are doing? What will make us lift our heads from our daily grind to see that the promises written on the wall are no longer what we believed them to be? Will we one day wake to see that all the laws have been rewritten, just as all the Animal Farm's commandments were erased and replaced with "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others"?

  Next up: #30 The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford