George Orwell & Animal Farm

In my opinion, nothing has contributed so much to the corruption of the original idea of socialism as the belief that Russia is a socialist country and that every act of its rulers must be excused, if not imitated. And so for the last ten years, I have been convinced that the destruction of the Soviet myth was essential if we wanted a revival of the socialist movement.

- Preface to the Ukrainian edition of Animal Farm, as published in The Collected Essays, Journalism, and Letters of George Orwell : As I please, 1943-1945 (1968)

 

It was only recently that I picked up the Animal Farm from the library, for reading. I had read two of his auto-biographical works ‘Homage to Catalonia’ and ‘Down and out in Paris and London’ and had ever been glued onto the Orwellian perspectives. Animal Farm is, as anybody would know, one of his most popular satire based on the Soviet union during the Stalin’s rule. As much the story is, interesting were the introduction and several prefaces that had been compiled over the book. And as the literary critics claim, this had been one of the daring satire on Soviet Union and highly misinterpreted book much to the sake of the cold war propaganda machines, which in fact contributed to its immense popularity.

 

George Orwell, born in Calcutta, left for England for schooling to come back later to Burma to join the Indian Imperial police. Having witnessed the ruthlessness of imperial police force he quits the job and leaves for England to concentrate on literary activities. Like many writers and poets did in those days, to free themselves from bourgeoisie culture, he decided to lead a ‘Bohemian’ lifestyle in a Parisian working class suburb in a tiny uncleaned room infested with bed bugs. He later spends a similar life style with the tramps of London. His Down and out in Paris and London comes from those adventures.  He later travels to Catalonia to fight along with Anarchists (Trotskyites), against Franco’s fascist forces during which he gets shot through his throat. His Homage to Catalonia accounts his adventures on the war front, commentary on the sophistications of a subaltern’s army and the betrayal of the Soviet supported allied troupe. In between the war, the idea of permanent revolution and the war of independence locked the horns of the Trotskyites and the Stalinists. Orwell believed in a socialism that promoted human freedom and a classless society which he found in Barcelona when it was under the control of the anarchists. Waiters never accepted tips, none address each others as senors or senoritas – they were all comrades. But then the Stalinists, who had been supported by the soviet union, wanted to postpone the revolution for the sake of war against the Franco, which they argued couldn’t go hand in hand as Trotskyites claimed. This later took an ugly turn when the Stalinists captured the Anarchists buildings leading to an internal crisis and bloodshed which ended in the persecution of the Trotskyites as traitors. The Stalinists were much ably equipped with arms compared to the Trotskyites, latter only armed with rifles that either explode when fired or are always jammed. Orwell though manages to escape the persecution, had to witness all his comrades getting captured and ‘disappear’. 

 

Europe, at that time was heavily influenced by the success of Russian revolution. It was, since the failure of Paris Commune, the proletariat government coming to existence breaking the cynicism of the right-wing world. The intellectuals, workers, peasants were all in the move to change the face of Europe. Labour parties and new leftist movements erupted throughout the world since then. Orwell after compilation of the Homage to Catalonia found it difficult to get the book published, which was then picked up by a pro-Trotskyites publishing company which gave much negative publicity to the book as it was conveniently made to believe a Trotskyite propaganda behind it. The idea of Animal Farm must have been in his mind ever since that incident. Orwell was surprised at the silence Britain was having against incorrect propagandas of the Soviet Union and on its contrary censorship move against any anti-soviet union literature. It was a situation where a criticism against Britain is tolerated while a criticism against Soviet union was not. He was annoyed that when the British press did wrote in detail about the famine in Bengal, they chose not to report the famine in Ukraine.  The Soviet Union, at the meantime, was improving ties with European nations through the workers union and intellectual circles which were having tremendous influence in the political arena as it would prove in later years at the emergence of socialist parties in Europe. Hence, after he compiled the Animal Farm there was no publisher ready to pick the work out of a fear of displeasure from the government. He quotes, the left leaning publishers were blind and wished to stay so while the right-wing publishers shied away quoting excuses like unavailability of paper and representing the head of the Animal Farm a pig. The only publishing company that came forward was the same Trotskyite leaning Secker and Warburg who published his Homage to Catalonia. Both the author and publisher was aware that this work might get criticized as a usual Trotskyite, anti-Stalinist literature hence that book was, after several delays, published post war as Animal Farm: A fairy tale.

 

This was, thus, initially promoted as a children’s book, much to Orwell’s annoyance. And since the end of World war and the beginning of the cold war, this book rose to immense popularity due to its childlike narration of history of modern Russia. As mentioned earlier, much to the irony of the original theme, this was then set to become part of the propaganda machines of capitalist block during the cold war, primarily United states. The prefaces of the American editions were largely botched, trying to convey that Orwell was actually writing against Socialism. Much of Ronald Reagan’s propaganda videos tried to replicate the imagery created by Orwell’s Animal Farm. An abridged version was later included as part of the children’s curriculum in schools as a lesson on the evils of socialism. It became a household name for utopian socialist society. Naturally the book was banned in all the soviet bloc’s as well as the countries on soviet alliance adding value to the myth. Though the original title had ‘A fairy tale’ written on it, that was taken out by many publishing companies later so that people don’t ignore it as a children’s book. Several right winged book reviews generously praised Orwell for his anti-communist intellect. Some even argued that this book received much acclaim purely due to its utility during the cold war time.

 

Much to the polarized state of the world during cold war period, a critical study of his work was not widely taken up due to its political influence. Interestingly it was children who alone took the book in its right sense. When spoke to some children, what they understood from the story was simply right, what Orwell wanted to say. The children spoke that they supported the animal farm when they overthrew the Mr. Jones as Mr. Jones was abusive and treated animals badly, while later, was saddened by how evil animals like the Pigs cheated and killed good animals like the horses, for power. There were many critics who question the usage of Animals taking control of the farm from Humans, as it portrays an unrealistic takeover. This picture was again used to convey a futility of a socialist system that it is inherently unstable. The true failure had nothing to do with the animals taking over the farm. In fact the story did proceed with the initial success of their farm through equality and hard work. Orwell states in his prefaces that his intention was not to project the takeover of farm by animals as a futile move but rather pin point the corruptibility  of power, that lead to the ultimate betrayal of the revolution. Looking at his writings and his accounts on days with anarchists, he probably favoured a liberal socialism with an inclination towards anarchism, out of his distrust on any ‘ruling’ system or ‘big brother’ susceptible to corruption (expressed in 1984).