Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy. Whatever tells a story, or has words on paper, is a friend.
The long saga between me and Animal Farm
I was 14 years old. My English teacher solemnly announced that Animal Farm by George Orwell was part of the required reading for the class next semester. Everyone groaned. Required reading was bad enough but to make things worse, they just had to choose the most boring books for us to read. My teacher smirked, knowing that this assignment was a punishment worse than being sent to jail.
Summer break happened. The required reading was put on hold. Up until the very last minute.
The day before the new semester ought to begin, I forced my head into Animal Farm, despising it to my very core. It was so dull, I stopped reading with my brain five pages through.
Resorted to listening to a free three-hour audiobook I found on YouTube. Not much better, but I managed to get through one hour of the book before ultimately admitting defeat.
Fast forward six years later, my opinion on Animal Farm has vastly changed.
What changed my mind
Knowing how horrible my first experience was, who in their right mind would want to put themselves through such agony again? YouTube's Resident Librarian and one of my favourite content creators, Jack Edwards, mentioned in one of his videos that Animal Farm was the book that inspired him to study English Literature. As far as I know, Jack and I have vastly different tastes in books—his taste in books is more sophisticated than what I would ever pick for myself—but that got me thinking. If Animal Farm managed to change this one person's perspective on linguistics, maybe I should give it a second chance.
And so I did.
Because I threw out my old copy (after all that trauma, you can't expect any less of me), I had to get a new one. And this time, I did everything my English teacher wanted me to have done and more. I read it from front to back twice, studying the footnotes and analysing the text, making annotations and doing extra research on the book. Safe to say, I was obsessed.
And here's what I thought about it. Don't mind me skipping out on all the historical context though, because I am no intellect in that sector.
Animal Farm is set in a dimension where the animals are intelligent creatures. They are overthrowing their owners' farms in a rebellion, they know how to read and write, and they can manage their territory. We have the pigs, the leaders of the farm; dogs, the pigs' security personnel; horses, the farm's backbone; the sheep; and the chicken.
The animals devise a plan to overthrow Jones's farm, the Manor Farm, to gain the equality and freedom they have been wishing for. The plan goes well and the animals work together to create an organisation that can reap all their benefits.
As time goes on, some animals find a bigger share of the benefits for themselves. The others start to question the actions of their leaders. Little by little, the pigs gain more power and authority. As the rules mysteriously change, the animals are forced to question what society they were fighting for in the first place and whether their newfound freedom was as blissful as they had imagined.
All animals are equal. But some animals are more equal than others.
I loved Animal Farm. There were so many amazing aspects in the book that I enjoyed.
My thoughts on Animal Farm
Right off the bat, Orwell's writing is wonderful to read. It is engaging, delightful and inspiring. The text jumped out at me and I felt all the emotions and more. I was so angry at the pigs and for all the farm animals who had to suffer under their rule. Oh, how I wished I could knock some sense into all of them to overthrow the pigs!
The beautiful text and the brilliant plot made for a splendid story. It started off with the rebellion, which was the mark of a new era, and caused many rules on the farm to change. Although there was no proper resolution to the story, I think the ending was done with well-thought. It was the perfect mix of surprise, grief and curiosity to gnaw at your heart.
I think one factor of the brilliant plot was the inclusion of a diverse mix of characters. All the animals had their own role to play on the farm and that made all of them important to the story. However, I did find myself wishing that there was more depth and screen time (or reading time?) for some of them. Boxer, for one, was one of the main motivators for the other animals to work harder, but he had a one-dimensional mindset that I found to be very boring. While, it was of Boxer's nature to be naive and oblivious to the conditions on the farm, we could have been spared some of that repetitiveness in this novella. On the other hand, I would have loved to see more of Benjamin in the story. He was a mere side character in the beginning but seemed to take on more responsibility towards the end.
Reading Animal Farm again six years later was not the same ordeal I remembered going through when I was 14, but I did not regret doing that again.
Animal Farm lives to prove that a book isn't bad just because someone didn't like it. It was just not the right one for me at that period of time. But maybe in a few years' time, who knows? It might be one of the best reads you'll ever encounter.
★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
Genre: Classic
Series: Standalone
Number of pages: 113
Year published: 1945
Version read: Paperback
TW: Animal abuse, animal murder, death, suicide, violence
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