On the first look, Animal farm by George Orwell may seem childish. After all, it is a story about speaking animals who run their own farm. This is not what the book is actually about. It is an allegory. As unusual as it is, Animal Farm is about the Russian Revolution in 1917.
Why you should read it
Animal Farm is not a long book, it
is only 112 pages long. Along with being short, the plot is fairly simple. Understanding the characters and their actions is easy. Even though the meaning
behind the book is not tailored for young children, it is written in a way that
they could read it. Standing alone, it is already a quaint book to read. What
makes this book special, though, is how it ties in with the Russian Revolution
and Stalin’s rise to power. Most, if not all of the characters can be tied to
real-life people who were involved in it.
I recommend that if you do choose to read Animal Farm, which you should, to do a bit of research about Stalin's rise to power, the Russian Revolution, Leon Trotsky's place in it, Karl Marx, and Vladimir Lenin.
The plot
The animals on a farm are unhappy with how it is run, so they stage a revolution against their human owner. They drive him away and can now make a farm that is run by the animals. The brains of the operation are two pigs, Snowball and Napoleon. At first, the farm is going well. They write 7 basic rules. Soon Napoleon begins taking more power for himself, and he starts undermining and changing the original 7 rules. The human owner is Tsar Nicholas II, who was forced to abdicate. Snowball is a mix between Leon Trotsky and Lenin. Napoleon is Stalin, who ruled the Soviet Union.
At its worst, Animal Farm is an uncomplicated story of how an Animal-controlled farm goes awry. At its best, it is a sharp-witted, political, satirical, and allegorical book about the Russian Revolution and its aftermath.
-Coleman
I always wanted to read Animal Farm, hearing this review I really want to read it. Honestly I love how satirical it would be with animals planning things, but its so much more than that.
ReplyDeleteThe first page or so really does make it seem like a playful, fun book about animals, but the second you turn that page, you can tell it's anything but...
DeleteI read this book a year or so ago and knew that it had political references but didn't do the research to find out. I don't remember being super blown away by anything in the book itself so I think you're right to say that the plot was uncomplicated. Thanks for the rough background; it was really satisfying to finally know what the characters meant and I'll do some more research.
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing, Coleman. Though, I am not used to short stories, it seems interesting to read. I will go ahead and put it in my "to-read" list!
DeleteI started this book at one point, maybe in subbie English on a free reading day, and even though I didn't finish it, I found the part of the book that I read extremely well written and a excellent example of some real life events and occurrences portrayed extremely well in fiction, which I find very illuminating. Thanks for reminding me about this book Coleman, I will be sure to remember to finish it at some point!
ReplyDeleteI started this book in subbie year, and absolutely loved it. Everything you said about it holds true to most of what I read in it. Good job!
ReplyDeleteI remember this book being mentioned a lot in the Banned Book Project. It was always something I was interested in reading after hearing about it during that project. I'm glad I was reminded of this book from this review, and I really want to read it now! Thanks!
ReplyDeleteRead this book during the Banned book project, and to this day it is still one of my favorite and one of the most memorable book ever for me. I really liked how George Orwell wrote Napoleon as a character, he was a perfect representation of Stalin and his view's on communism, how Stalin and Napoleon both started with the intentions of following their predecessors but eventually going the complete opposite route. Stalin went to industrialization while Napoleon went to humanization. This book can also be summarized by the infamous quote by Mr.Obi Wan Kenobi: "You have become the very thing you swore to destroy!"
ReplyDeleteI remember watching a movie of Animal Farm back in 7th grade. It was pretty eye-opening but I never got a chance to read the book. I will definitely try reading this book soon. Thanks!
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