(1903-1950)

Real Name: Eric Blair

British Political Novelist

Born: To English parents in India

After his father retired, Eric and his family moved back to England.

1911

He was sent to a boarding school at the age of 8 to prepare for Eton, an exclusive prep school.

Because he had a scholarship, he was teased and humiliated frequently.

                                     

                                          1921-At 18, he passed the Empire’s Civil Service Exam and became a police officer

in Burma.          

*Whose rules was he enforcing?

Returned in Europe

* What life lessons can you learn while dishwashing?

Socialist: someone who believes that the government should own businesses so that everyone will be cared for.

Government can *Redistribute $$$$

*Make the “game” more fair

Fables have 2 levels of meaning.

On the surface, the fable is about animals. On 2nd level, animals = types of people or ideas. The way the animals interact & the way the plot unfolds helps us understand the nature of people or the value of ideas. Fiction with multiple levels of meaning is called allegory.

Why Animals?• In explaining how he came to write Animal Farm,

Orwell says he once saw a little boy whipping a horse and later he wrote, “It struck me that if only such animals became aware of their

strength we should have no power over them, and that men exploit animals in much the same way as the rich exploit the [worker].”

In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement.[

Animal Farm is a satire of political society after the Bolshevik Revolution.

PRE 1900’s ---Russian society had two social classes: a tiny minority (bourgeoisie) controlled the country’s wealth.

The working class was called the proletariat.

1917---Communism arose in Russia when the nation’s workers & peasants rebelled against and overwhelmed the wealthy and powerful class of capitalists & aristocrats.

Romanovs

• Old Russia had been ruled for 300 years by a family called the Romanovs. They were called czars (or tsars) and ruled as kings and queens.

• They lived a fantastic life in their palace, surrounded by all kinds of luxuries.

Animalism = Communism• Animalism

– Taught my Old Major

– No rich, but no poor

– Better life for workers

– All animals are equal

– Everyone owns the farm

• Communism– Invented by Karl Marx

– All people are equal

– Government owns everything

– People own the government

Farmer Jones = Czar Nicholas II

• Farmer Jones– The irresponsible owner of the

farm

– Lets his animals starve and beats them with a whip

– Sometimes shows random kindness

• Czar Nicholas II– Weak Russian leader during the

early 1900s

– Often cruel and brutal to his subjects

– Displays isolated kindess

SnowballA clever pig with a head for ideas,

he becomes one of the main leaders of Animal Farm and

the author of its central commandments.

                              

NapoleonA pig with a gift for techniques of control,

he establishes most of the farm’s rules and eventually

becomes its sole leader.

                      

Old Major An elderly show pig whose instruction to the animals

about "animalism" becomes the philosophical basis

for the creation of Animal Farm.

                      

SquealerA pig with the ability to make any

idea sound reasonable, he is Napoleon's side-kick

and is in charge of communicating to the animals.

                      

BoxerA strong and hard-working carthorse,

he shows tremendous faith in the rebellion and its leaders.