The animals
are delighted after they run Farmer Jones off and take over the Manor Farm. They rename itand
establish a set of principles that promise equality and a new way of life. They all work
together and are motivated to work extra hard because of the sense of ownership they feel. They
even bring in the harvest two days early:
All through that
summer the work of the farm went like clockwork. The animals were happy as they had never
conceived it possible to be. Every mouthful of food was an acute positive pleasure, now that it
was truly their own food, produced by themselves and for themselves, not doled out to them by a
grudging master. With the worthless parasitical human beings gone, there was more for everyone
to eat.
They also find they have more leisure
time.
However, from the beginning of the new regime,plants hints that all is
not well. The pigs don't do manual labor at all, taking on the role of supervisors.tries to hide
(with his body) a bucket of milk the animals wish to divide up between them, and later it
disappears. Evenagrees that the pigs should get the windfall apples for their
"brainwork." From the start, there is a strong intimation that the pigs are going to
ruin everything by setting themselves apart as a privileged elite.
But it is
not until Napoleon runs Snowball off the farm that life grow openly dystopian. At this point,
withto back him up with fast-talking propaganda and the ferocious dogs as a police force,
Napoleon is able to establish himself as a dictator and terrorize the other animals. Soon
enough, they all, except for the pigs, are back to the old situation they were in under Farmer
Jones, only worse.
Orwell shows that it is difficult to set up a utopia if
there is a group or individual actively working to undermine it. It is important that the little
things that nibble around the edges of the rules be stomped out early and quickly, or, the book
illustrates, tyranny will follow.
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