George Orwell wrote this book in a satyric way. The whole story is like a fable, because the main characters are animals. These animals have human qualities, most of them are dull, for example, the sheep or the poultry, but the pigs are the most intelligent animals on this farm.
The story begins when the farmer Jones comes home drunk, as he does every week and he does not feed his animals as usual. So the animals become mad and they invade his house and kick him off his farm. This action happened also in the history. The Big October Revolution in Russia was an example of it. As we will see further the main characters really lived, but in human body and they have changed also our life.
After this revolution, the animals have a meeting. The chairsheads of this meeting were two pigs. Napoleon as J.V. Stalin in real and Snowball as L.Trotsky in real. At first these animals created some rules. Some of them were as follows – All animals are equal or No animals shall sleep in a bed or drink alcohol... These 7 rules were the cornerstone of their being.
They also changed the name of the farm from Manor farm to Animal farm. And not only this made Jones – the owner of the farm angry, so he decided to take revenge. He called some men and one early mornig they did the counter attack on the farm. But the animals were not blind and deaf, they had spies – pigeons. The attack of the men began. As the animals saw the rifles in their hands, they tried to escape. But the men were also quick and caught up with the animals up. The men thought they won, but it was only a trap. All the other animals surrounded them and the only way out was the broken fence near them.
This was a memorial day of the Battle of Cowshed, as they called it. They have beaten the men. During the next months Napoleon declared Snowball a traitor and he expelled him from the Animal farm. So Napoleon (Stalin) became the only dictator on the farm. He stole Snowball`s plans of a windmill and began building it. He claimed that Snowball had stolen them from him and not reversely. During the time the men destroyed it two times, but the animals were hardworking and they finished it. But they were not happy then, because during the 3 years of hard work, the food was miserable, only the pigs and dogs (bodyguards of the pigs) were fat, Napolen changed all the rules on his own. For example, All animals are equal but some are more equal than others, or No animals shall sleep in a bed with sheets.
In the end Napoleon became the ultimate dictator, nobody could argue with him, or he would die.
Actually in the end the pigs changed totally, they walked on their hind legs, they invited the men for a visit and and the other animals were actually slaves.
My opinion:
The book is written in an interesting way. I liked the connection between the pigs and the comunist leaders. I think that Orwell has done a good writing although he never lived in a socialist country. His style of writing correspondents to that period, all the animals on the farm called themselves comrades. After the
elections in the farm Napoleon was appointed a president. There were no opponents in the elections, so the whole book has all typical lines of the reign of Stalin.
I would recommend this book to boys, or to people who like history and know the context.
