Death to Humanity, Long live Animal Farm! Over the last couple weeks I have been reading Animal Farm (by George Orwell), a satire of totalitarian countries and leaders spanning from the 1920s to the 1950s. To give a brief synopsis of the book so you first understand it, the story starts out on a small farm where animals who slave daily for an ungrateful incompetent master lead an insurrection which ousts him and establishes a new order called "Animalism". Animalism soon becomes contorted and turned from a brotherhood of animals into a dictatorship, similar to the former regime but now they slave for one of their own, not a Farmer. On a broad level one could say this is the book in a nutshell, but when looked at on a deeper level you realize the true satire of it and how greatly it is a lesson for mankind. You realize this through the way it explores the topic of control, how it proves the life lesson that an administration's principles and actions should be the agreement of ethics between the leader and the people as a whole, also how great a role symbolism can play in literature.
The first reason why this book is recommendable to anyone is its deep exploration of the topic control. In the beginning of the story there are two leaders, the first named Snowball, is the representation of a moderate leader interested in the betterment of mankind, that's to say, animal-kind. The second leader, Napoleon is a hard-line totalitarian who wants to meticulously lead animals as he sees fit. The real meaning of control is to have authority or dominating influence over.the key word being influence. In the book Napoleon finally wins control over the people through the means of subtlety. Rather than Snowball's democratic decisions where everyone was involved, Napoleon found that through small changes in daily routine that favored him he could instill confidence in the masses and after they realized this they would follow the one making them feel best about themselves.