Gorge Orwell and Animal Farm

Kim Ju Seung

During the Spainish civil war, Eric Arthur Blair was a soldier of the leftist army. He really adhered to the ideal of socialism but leftists he found were not such men as he had thought they were. He witnessed about socialists' fighting for authority. He had hard time because of this infighting and he was very disappointed about socialism. Maybe he was especially disappointed deeply because he really believed in socialism. Finally, he come back to his country, England. Several years later he wrote an impressive novel, [Animal Farm]. Now, he is better known to us as George Orwell.

He was born in India in 1903. His father was a middle class government employee. Maybe Orwell was a smart boy. He gain entrance into Eton school in 1911. But his school life was not happy. In Eton school, all of the students were sons of rich except him. He felt too much discrimination around him. Finally he gave up the university and became a policeman in Myanmar. But also the policeman could not be his position. He hated the colonial system of England, so he resigned policeman job. He did not have anything to do. He lived very poorly in London and Paris. Because of his experiences of discrimination, poverty and the colonial system, he became a socialist. And finally he became a soldier in the socialist army of Spain. But as noted before, he became disappointed in socialism. This disappointment created [Animal Farm].

There is a big farm named Manor farm. Animals work hard for farm, but they are always starving and abused. Wise old pig Old Major thinks that it is because their master, Mr. Jones extorts them. So, Old Major makes other animals recognized. After Old Major dies, animals success to drive out Mr. Jones and makes [Animal Farm]. Two young pigs, Napoleon and Snowball leads other animals. They always confront each other. Finally Napoleon drives away Snowball and be one and only leader of Animal Farm. He strengthens autocracy without animals' realization. At last Napoleon and other pigs become same as men, masters of animals.

When [Animal Farm] was written, the sovereign of the USSR was Stalin. He was a typical dictator. He suppressed his people with communist ideology. Orwell knew exact identity of Stalin. So, he criticized Stalin by this novel. Napoleon of the Animals is as same as Stalin of the USSR. Snowball is the same as Trotsky, Stalin's rival. Mr. Jones and other people are as same as Tsar and other dynasties. Orwell wrote about how communist autocracy became the same as a dynasty.

Now, all of communist sodiety have collapsed except for North Korea. But Orwell's sharp insight still has meanings. Because all periods of human history have each here own problems and someone should offer insight on such problems. [Animal Farm] is still an effective novel because we can see Orwell's insight in this novel.

-References-

Webpages

http://star.empas.com/people/info/ge/or/georgeorwell/

http://kr.encycl.yahoo.com/final.html?id=115731



News

Lee Seung Sun, George Orwell's down life experiences, PRESSian, 6th, Dec, 2003

Han Yoon Jung, Poor life is beautiful,Kyunghyang news paper,5th,Dec,2003



Book

George Orwell(English Book)

George Orwell(Korean Book)

Links to other sites on the Web

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