Isabella Meyn

hOW DO FICTIONAL TEXTS PARALLEL THE REAL WORLD?

 

An allegory is, in short, an extended metaphor. Its characters, actions and objects mirror concepts outside the narrative itself, hiding and conveying alternate meanings through symbolic figures. The novel Animal Farm is possibly the most well-known allegorical book, written by George Orwell, acclaimed novelist, during World War II, and creating his own mythical version of an infamous historical event. The story has its representations of characters as historical figures, events in the book that directly relate to events in history, and even characters that symbolize abstract concepts and ideas; such as propaganda or marxism.

 

The story takes place in Manor Farm (later to be known as Animal Farm), that is a model of Russia, for the entire book is Orwell’s criticism of the Russian Government. The person in charge of Manor Farm, Mr. Jones, symbolises the Czar Nicholas II. Mr. Jones is later pushed out of the farm by the animals, such as the Czar was eventually overthrown by the Russian folk. The two main characters, Snowball and Napoleon, are representatives of Trotsky and Stalin, respectively. In addition, Old Major is Karl Marx, and his teachings of Animalism are allegories for Communism. Other characters such as Mollie (the Bourgeois), Boxer (the working class), Moses (the Russian Orthodox Church), and Napoleon’s business partners Pilkington (England) and Frederick (Nazi Germany) all symbolise their own allegorical concepts. Other abstract things, not historical events or personalities, such as Sugarloaf Mountain (heaven) and the windmill (Stalin’s five-year plan) are all allegories as well. The major event of the story, the revolution of the animals in Manor Farm against Mr. Jones, is an obvious parallel of the Russian Revolution.

The phrase “When Power Corrupts” is the major theme of Animal Farm. With the farm’s original leader, Mr. Jones, we can already see that he is driven by the power he holds over the animals. When he is overthrown, he falls into a great depression and spurt of violence for losing that control he used to have. The power then falls to Snowball’s and Napoleon’s hands, but quite soon they realize that it’s difficult maintaining their pledge of equality when you have a great deal of power and influence over a group of people, and so, Napoleon, overtaken by greed, framed Snowball as treacherous and once more the autonomy of Animal Farm is changed, first to communism, and now once more to capitalism. This shows that it’s very quite hard not to let power corrupt you once you know its extent and how it and you alike affect people placed directly under you.