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ANIMAL FARM - THEMES, MOTIFS & SYMBOLS
THEMES
Themes are the fundamental
and often universal ideas explored in a literary work.
The Corruption of Socialist Ideals in the Soviet Union
Animal Farm is
most famous in the West as a stinging critique of the
history and rhetoric of the Russian Revolution. Retelling
the story of the emergence and development of Soviet
communism in the form of an animal fable,
Animal Farm
allegorizes the rise to power of the dictator Joseph
Stalin. In the novella, the overthrow of the human
oppressor Mr. Jones by a democratic coalition of animals
quickly gives way to the consolidation of power among the
pigs. Much like the Soviet intelligentsia, the pigs
establish themselves as the ruling class in the new
society.
The struggle for
preeminence between Leon Trotsky and Stalin emerges in
the rivalry between the pigs Snowball and Napoleon. In
both the historical and fictional cases, the idealistic
but politically less powerful figure (Trotsky and
Snowball) is expelled from the revolutionary state by
the malicious and violent usurper of power (Stalin and
Napoleon). The purges and show trials with which Stalin
eliminated his enemies and solidified his political base
find expression in
Animal Farm as the false confessions and
executions of animals whom Napoleon distrusts following
the collapse of the windmill. Stalin’s tyrannical rule
and eventual abandonment of the founding principles of
the Russian Revolution are represented by the pigs’ turn
to violent government and the adoption of human traits
and behaviors, the trappings of their original
oppressors.
Although Orwell believed
strongly in socialist ideals, he felt that the Soviet
Union realized these ideals in a terribly perverse form.
His novella creates its most powerful ironies in the
moments in which Orwell depicts the corruption of
Animalist ideals by those in power. For
Animal Farm
serves not so much to condemn tyranny or despotism as to
indict the horrifying hypocrisy of tyrannies that base
themselves on, and owe their initial power to,
ideologies of liberation and equality. The gradual
disintegration and perversion of the Seven Commandments
illustrates this hypocrisy with vivid force, as do
Squealer’s elaborate philosophical justifications for
the pigs’ blatantly unprincipled actions. Thus, the
novella critiques the violence of the Stalinist regime
against the human beings it ruled, and also points to
Soviet communism’s violence against human logic,
language, and ideals.
The Societal Tendency toward Class Stratification
Animal Farm
offers commentary on the development of class tyranny
and the human tendency to maintain and reestablish class
structures even in societies that allegedly stand for
total equality. The novella illustrates how classes that
are initially unified in the face of a common enemy, as
the animals are against the humans, may become
internally divided when that enemy is eliminated. The
expulsion of Mr. Jones creates a power vacuum, and it is
only so long before the next oppressor assumes
totalitarian control. The natural division between
intellectual and physical labor quickly comes to express
itself as a new set of class divisions, with the
“brainworkers” (as the pigs claim to be) using their
superior intelligence to manipulate society to their own
benefit. Orwell never clarifies in
Animal Farm
whether this negative state of affairs constitutes an
inherent aspect of society or merely an outcome
contingent on the integrity of a society’s
intelligentsia. In either case, the novella points to
the force of this tendency toward class stratification
in many communities and the threat that it poses to
democracy and freedom.
The Danger of a Naïve Working Class
One of the novella’s most
impressive accomplishments is its portrayal not just of
the figures in power but also of the oppressed people
themselves. Animal Farm is not told from the perspective
of any particular character, though occasionally it does
slip into Clover’s consciousness. Rather, the story is
told from the perspective of the common animals as a
whole. Gullible, loyal, and hardworking, these animals
give Orwell a chance to sketch how situations of
oppression arise not only from the motives and tactics
of the oppressors but also from the naïveté of the
oppressed, who are not necessarily in a position to be
better educated or informed. When presented with a
dilemma, Boxer prefers not to puzzle out the
implications of various possible actions but instead to
repeat to himself, “Napoleon is always right.” Animal
Farm demonstrates how the inability or unwillingness to
question authority condemns the working class to suffer
the full extent of the ruling class’s oppression.
The Abuse of Language as Instrumental to the Abuse of Power
One of Orwell’s central
concerns, both in Animal
Farm and in 1984,
is the way in which language can be manipulated
as an instrument of control. In Animal Farm, the pigs
gradually twist and distort a rhetoric of socialist
revolution to justify their behavior and to keep the
other animals in the dark. The animals heartily embrace
Major’s visionary ideal of socialism, but after Major
dies, the pigs gradually twist the meaning of his words.
As a result, the other animals seem unable to oppose the
pigs without also opposing the ideals of the Rebellion.
By the end of the novella, after Squealer’s repeated
reconfigurations of the Seven Commandments in order to
decriminalize the pigs’ treacheries, the main principle
of the farm can be openly stated as “all animals are
equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”
This outrageous abuse of the word “equal” and of the
ideal of equality in general typifies the pigs’ method,
which becomes increasingly audacious as the novel
progresses. Orwell’s sophisticated exposure of this
abuse of language remains one of the most compelling and
enduring features of Animal Farm, worthy of close study
even after we have decoded its allegorical characters
and events.
MOTIFS
Motifs are recurring
structures, contrasts, or literary devices that can help
to develop and inform the text’s major themes.
SONGS
Animal Farm
is filled with songs, poems, and slogans, including
Major’s stirring “Beasts of England,” Minimus’s ode to
Napoleon, the sheep’s chants, and Minimus’s revised
anthem, “Animal Farm, Animal Farm.” All of these songs
serve as propaganda, one of the major conduits of social
control. By making the working-class animals speak the
same words at the same time, the pigs evoke an
atmosphere of grandeur and nobility associated with the
recited text’s subject matter. The songs also erode the
animals’ sense of individuality and keep them focused on
the tasks by which they will purportedly achieve freedom.
State Ritual
As
Animal Farm
shifts gears from its early revolutionary fervor to a
phase of consolidation of power in the hands of the few,
national rituals become an ever more common part of the
farm’s social life. Military awards, large parades, and
new songs all proliferate as the state attempts to
reinforce the loyalty of the animals. The increasing
frequency of the rituals bespeaks the extent to which
the working class in the novella becomes ever more
reliant on the ruling class to define their group
identity and values.
SYMBOLS
Symbols are objects,
characters, figures, or colors used to represent abstract
ideas or concepts.
Animal Farm
Animal Farm, known at the
beginning and the end of the novel as the Manor Farm,
symbolizes Russia and the Soviet Union under Communist
Party rule. But more generally, Animal Farm stands for
any human society, be it capitalist, socialist, fascist,
or communist. It possesses the internal structure of a
nation, with a government (the pigs), a police force or
army (the dogs), a working class (the other animals),
and state holidays and rituals. Its location amid a
number of hostile neighboring farms supports its
symbolism as a political entity with diplomatic concerns.
The Barn
The barn at Animal Farm,
on whose outside walls the pigs paint the Seven
Commandments and, later, their revisions, represents the
collective memory of a modern nation. The many scenes in
which the ruling-class pigs alter the principles of
Animalism and in which the working-class animals puzzle
over but accept these changes represent the way an
institution in power can revise a community’s concept of
history to bolster its control. If the working class
believes history to lie on the side of their oppressors,
they are less likely to question oppressive practices.
Moreover, the oppressors, by revising their nation’s
conception of its origins and development, gain control
of the nation’s very identity, and the oppressed soon
come to depend upon the authorities for their communal
sense of self.
The Windmill
The great windmill
symbolizes the pigs’ manipulation of the other animals
for their own gain. Despite the immediacy of the need
for food and warmth, the pigs exploit Boxer and the
other common animals by making them undertake
backbreaking labor to build the windmill, which will
ultimately earn the pigs more money and thus increase
their power. The pigs’ declaration that Snowball is
responsible for the windmill’s first collapse
constitutes psychological manipulation, as it prevents
the common animals from doubting the pigs’ abilities and
unites them against a supposed enemy. The ultimate
conversion of the windmill to commercial use is one more
sign of the pigs’ betrayal of their fellow animals. From
an allegorical point of view, the windmill represents
the enormous modernization projects undertaken in Soviet
Russia after the Russian Revolution.