Rethinking Animal Farm

Many of you know that during the school year I teach in Alaska. One of the books we use in our high school reading program is Animal Farm, by George Orwell.  Over the years I’ve read this, and his other dystopian novel, 1984, many times. However, as I read chapter ten of Animal Farm with the class, a paragraph seemed to jump from the page with new meaning. 

Later I pulled a copy from the shelf and looked back over the paragraph. The passage, penned over sixty years ago, seemed to be written for us today. As I read it, I replaced a few key words with others that had more current mean. The six words I have changed are listed below.

Original      Substitute

Farm            Country

Animals        People

Pigs              Politicians

Creatures     People

Dogs            Special Interests Groups

Squealer      Mainstream Media

            Here is how I now read the paragraph.

            “Somehow it seemed as though the country had grown richer without making the people themselves any richer—except, of course for the politicians and the special interests groups. Perhaps this was partly because there were so many politicians and special interests groups. It was not that these people did not work, after their fashion. There was, as the mainstream media was never tired of explaining, endless work in the supervision and organization of the country. Much of this work was of a kind that the other people were too ignorant to understand. For example, the main stream media told them that the politicians had to expend enormous labours every day upon mysterious things called “files,” “reports,” “minutes,” and “memoranda.” These were large sheets of paper which had to be closely covered with writing, and as soon as they were so covered, they were burnt in the furnace. This was of the highest importance for the welfare of the country the mainstream media said. But still, neither politicians nor special interest groups produced any food by their own labour; and there were very many of them, and their appetites were always good.”

             I know that my substitute words somewhat alter the focus of the passage from Orwell’s original intent. Originally his focus was not any democratic nation, but the Soviet Union. Squealer, for example, was inspired by Vyacheslav Molotov and Pravda. However the warning against the growth of government power seems particularly applicable to our current, American, situation.

If you have not read the book, pick up a copy from the library and do so. Read it to your children. It is one of those stories that young children will understand on one level, while the parent reading it will construe passages as I did while reading with the class. Eventually as children mature they will come to understand Orwell’s warning.

            If we, as a still free people, do not change the direction of our nation, then when we are once again subjects of a supreme ruler, we cannot say we did not see it coming. We are not ignorant like the horses and chickens of Animal Farm—George Orwell has warned us.