Why You Should Read “Animal Farm” by George Orwell, A Clever Dystopian Fiction to Critique A Power Abuse and Corrupt Regime
A Short Review of “Animal Farm” book by George Orwell (1945)
Animal Farm, for me, is a top-notch satire allegory novel of a corrupt socialist regime.
Animal Farm is an allegory of Russia/Soviet Union Revolution in 1917. It critiques the betrayal of Joseph Stalin. But eventhough it’s a specific critique to Russia’s government, Animal Farm is still relevant until this day due to universal politic nature. Political power abuse and political corrupts aren’t something new nor strange in the politic world. It has been happening since ages to this day, globally.
In this book, Orwell managed to explained the whole system of how a corrupt socialist regime works in an easy to read yet comprehensive writing.
A brilliantly hilarious satire quote from the book!
Such a brilliant book indeed.
This book consists sharp and fundamental criticism that is brought in a funny-cynical way. It contains lots of hidden sarcasms if you take a thorough look into it, such as the choosing of the pigs as the representative of the oppressive leader and more, which were clever and hilarious. It gave me the realization of these things:
1. Oppressed Mind = Oppressed Bodies
It succeed in making me feeling empathetic with the oppressed people who were created by the regime and that frustrates me so bad. It made me understand of how important it is to be able to liberate our minds so we will be able to liberate our bodies.
The only way to get out of an oppresed regime is through education. That’s why this book reignites the fire in my soul to be vocal of the importance of education and reminds me to properly educate my self in hope that one day, I’ll be able to educate other people too ♡
2. The Importance of Narration in Cooperation
Animal Farms reminds me of how important narration is in building a nation. It doesn’t matter if the narration is an ethically/morally correct thing or not nor if the narration is (factually) beneficial or not for the good of the people. As long as you can convince the people that it is a morally correct and beneficial thing to do, you will be fine.
People don’t work together just because they want to. People work together because they believe in the same narration or ideology that convinces them this cooperation should be done. Those "animals" able to cooperate together because they fall into a false belief of a narration that is promoted by their leaders. A false belief that they’re cooperating and working hard to liberate themselves from the oppressor (which was represented by humans) while the reality is they are working hard to be slaves of the new oppressor (which was represented by pigs). The pigs who were positioned as the government in the book use slogans such as “Four legs good, two legs bad” to create this belief that animals should dismiss humans, also “All animals are equal” to rally the other animals behind them.
It reminds me of Sapiens by Yuval N. Harari which said how we, humans, only able to cooperate together in a large number by believing in the same narration.
3. How Manipulation of The Government Is Done
Another thing that fascinates me about this book is how Orwell managed to write out how government have done manipulation to it’s people. Orwell critiqued how government manipulate the people by using it’s people’s weaknesses and knowledge limitations.
Most of the animals in the Animal Farm are illiterate. They can’t fully comprehend The Seven Commandments which was made by the pigs. This weakness limits the animal in understanding what have actually happened to them. The pigs change the rule now and then as they like. While the animal sense something is off, they can’t be truly sure of their suspection because sadly, the animals dimly remember the commandments. In the other hand, they can’t match their memory to what is actually written in the commandments because they can’t read. This gives the government opportunity to manipulate them.
What Can We Take
I can’t mumble enough of how clever this book is — an elegant and intellect way to express our critique to the government. It contains a substantial critique that is covered by a clever satire.
As an Indonesian college student, I’ve been seeing a lot of criticisms disposed by Indonesian college students to the government especially in the election period that we’re currently facing. This book can be an example for all of us (especially us who currently have the status of college students) of how a critique to the government should be done.
Animal Farm by Orwell definitely deserves it’s Classic Literature title. I enjoyed reading it so much. Whether you love politic/satires or not, I’d still think you must read this book for at least once in your lifetime ❤️
