Greed sets the stage for George Orwell’s classic, Animal Farm. Although it is presented as a fairy story with no obvious meanings, Orwell had a specific objective in mind. Farmer Jones, the owner of the farm, was not just an ordinary English farmer, and nor were his animals simple farm creatures. Before getting too far into this, we must abandon our paradigm of a farm to understand this book. It’s nothing like the farm in this book (Charlotte’s Web). In Orwell’s anthropomorphic setting, the animals have rights too, and their personalities are just as real as the humans.
If we keep our real life view of animals, we might be tempted to claim that Farmer Jones “owned” them. But this will not sit right once we begin to read since the animals are able to communicate, think, write, dream, and so on. They trade, build, plan, and learn. This is not simply a device to make the story work. Orwell quite purposefully sets the animals up as anthropomorphic slaves of Farmer Jones.
With this in mind, Jones’ treatment of the animals purely for his own profit is greedy. I don’t think any reader of this book holds any sympathy for Jones or his hired hands.
On to the pigs, then, the iconic central characters of the book. The pigs, who are never presented in any personal light and whose minds remain closed to the otherwise omniscient reader. The pigs represent the impersonal nature of the self-serving greed of tyrants. By the end, the pigs resemble humans so closely (“four legs good, two legs better”) it is impossible to discern between them.
Greed Trumps Greed
The story begins with a promise of more for less. More leisure time, more food, and more fun, all for less work. Old Major, the first pig, talked of freedom from labor, full bellies, long lives, and best of all, no more Farmer Jones or his whip.
I’m not criticizing the animals for wanting such a change in their lives. Obviously, there was enough food on the farm to warrant such promises. In context, the desire for freedom from slavery was a fair one. Whether Old Major’s vision was realistically achievable for the animals is debatable. In either case, I would not call the majority of animals on the farm greedy.
The pigs, however, fall into a different category. Snowball and Napoleon had ulterior motives. They saw not just the opportunity to cast off the tyrant Jones, but in fact to fill the gap themselves. Snowball was possibly more gentle in his approach to it, certainly less violent, but both pigs were equally greedy.
Snowball’s scheming was eventually circumvented by Napoleon’s, who was far more devious. Napoleon evicted Snowball, used the memory of his brother as a bloody weapon, and constantly dredged up rumors and falsehoods of the departed pig to drive his own agenda.
Should we feel sorry for Snowball? A traitorous, tyrannical, former friend chased him from the farm, a farm he helped to establish. Napoleon vilified him and stole his reputation and dreams.
But in spite of that, I don’t think Snowball earned any sympathy. Certainly none from me.
Can There Be Heroes with no Villains?
I don’t know if there are heroes, but are there even any villains in Orwell’s classic Animal Farm? It’s easy to dislike the pigs, but are they villains? It’s hard to say they are, if only because there aren’t any heroes to object.
Within this animal-driven world, there appear to be no repercussions for amoral behavior. Napoleon, Squealer, and the rest of the pigs live on the sweat and labor of the other animals. They succeed in supplanting one task master only to become an identical replacement with no negative consequences. No one in the book seems to object.
However, none of the readers of Animal Farm live in such a world.
And that allows us to cast our own moral judgments on what the characters “ought” to have done, an impossible feat for anyone in the book. From our perspective, Napoleon is clearly a villain. He lies, cheats, and murders to get what he wants, which is personal gain. What is his motivation? Unknown. Does he justify his actions with a twisted morality? Unknown. Is he deluded to the point that he actually thinks he deserves more? Unknown. All we really know of him is what his reign produces: misery.
So what about Snowball? Snowball preceded Napoleon in the rule of the farm. And perhaps Orwell was just so good of writer that by the end of the book, the reader almost feels like Snowball had been done wrong by Napoleon. Perhaps the reader might even begin to feel that the outcome would have been different had Snowball remained in control.
But this, I believe, is incorrect, and is the basis for Orwell’s entire premise. Snowball had the same outcome in mind as Napoleon, he was perhaps just a little less bloodthirsty than his brother. But his ultimate goal was to subsist on the labor of others. He would have been a tyrant all the same.
Heroic Side Note
I said there were no heroes in Animal Farm, and I might be correct. However, if there actually were a hero in the book, the only one I would nominate is Mollie. Of all the characters, she is the only one who casts off the imposed society of the pigs and seeks her own life. Unlike most traditional heroes, however, her motivation is purely selfish, and she does nothing to help anyone else.
Peace and Harmony
If you want to be slightly annoyed, listen to this (on continuous repeat if you want to know what it’s like to have little kids).
Whether or not Napoleon and Snowball truly desired peace and harmony is debatable (and I would argue they did not). And if Old Major honestly wanted it either, I can’t say. He doesn’t last long enough to invite much analysis. But undoubtedly, the majority of the farm animals capable of any type of thought wanted peace and harmony. They wanted the promised utopia.
The main characters, Boxer and Clover, firmly believed they were headed for such a state all the way to the end. Benjamin didn’t hope for it on the surface, but I think he did secretly. He hoped against the pessimistic experience of his long life. They were all disappointed.
These simple creatures, both in mind and desire, fall prey to the greed of the conniving pigs, Snowball and Napoleon. Orwell purposefully directed this book at one of the eminent powers of his day, the Soviet Union. Even when it appeared that the communist rule there was so successful, Orwell knew that it was built on a false foundation of lies and tyranny. He had seen the evil underpinnings firsthand during the Spanish Civil War.
Be Greedy or Be Good
Orwell’s message in Animal Farm is fundamental, and not limited to his time. The message I take from it is that an idyllic society can only exist if each member of it lives the right way. Each member must act with integrity and not take advantage of another no matter what possibility is presented. Each person would have to eliminate greed from their heart. There is no way to force such a life on any group. It must be chosen unanimously, or it will not succeed.
Earlier, I reference Charlotte’s Web as an opposite farm to Animal Farm, and I think the spider herself is an excellent contrast to the pigs. Although they live for themselves alone, she lived her entire life for someone else, to build them up. Charlotte’s way was far more likely to produce the utopia the animals sought than any other.
Photo credit: Martin Pettitt on Visualhunt / CC BY
Photo credit: amboo who? on Visual Hunt / CC BY-SA
Understanding a situation from another person’s perspective is called empathy. It’s no simple skill to acquire. I title this post “Empathy, the Hero Maker” because the people that do the most good are those that can seek to understand. My heroes are those whose first thoughts are “why is she like that” or “how can I help him”?
