The novel, Animal Farm, was written by George Orwell and was published in 1946. The story is about a farm in England around the time of the Russian revolution, the book is a satire and a fable to the Russian revolution. The animals on Manor Farm are irritated with the way they are being treated, so they start a revolution. The pigs, who were the smartest animals on the farm, took control of the farm while the other animals worked. Throughout the novel the pigs lie to the other animals and change the rules, of the farm to accommodate themselves. George Orwell's real name was Eric Blair. He was born in 1903. He went to school at Eton, and after service with the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, he returned to Europe to earn his living writing novels and essays. He was a political writer who wrote of his own times. He was a man of intense feelings and fierce hates. He hated cant and lying and cruelty in life and in literature. He was critical of communism but was himself a Socialist. The setting for Animal Farm is Manor Farm in England during the time of the Russian revolution.
Comparisons:
The main similarity in both of the novels is that an innocent dream could lead to great power and a person with great power can lead to being power hungry and corrupt on people.
In Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein is an ambitious, although misguided inventor, looking to solve the secret of life. He is the main character in the book ‘Frankenstein’. He is a scientist who challenges common science. He lives in a big family house in Geneva with all of his family. At first Frankenstein’s relationship with his family and friends is really close. When he moves to the university in Igolstadt he writes frequent letters to his family and Elizabeth. Frankenstein has an obsession with a desire to create life. He gets this uncontrollable desire from the unfortunate loss of his mother during the birth of his brother William. Frankenstein studied professor Waldman’s research on darker science and when the professor died it gave him the final push towards creating life. Frankenstein thought he owed it to the professor to finish his research. The research was time consuming this made his letters less frequent and shorter. Elizabeth felt isolated because of this and this made Frankenstein lonely as well. Victor’s research has lead him into creating a life, a ‘person’ or more like a ‘monster’.
The monster in ‘Frankenstein’ is a man made from the severed body parts from dead criminals that Frankenstein put together and brought it to life. He has overwhelming strength and is impetuous. The monster is lonely because he is incredibly hideous, repulsive and horrifying which cause people to panic and run away from him. The monster just wants to be loved and have a friend he can talk to; he doesn’t care who it is. In the book he lived in the woods for a while and noticed a family called the De Lacys who where struggling to survive during the winter. He became friends with them and helped the by doing hard manual work. Over time the monster saw what the de Lacy’s had and he fell in love with one of the de Lacys. When he told her his intensions she panic and gave him a look of disgust. Then the monster was mad with anger so he burnt them alive.
The monster is not monstrous on the inside. When he attempts to converse with a blind man he is temporarily successful, but that triumph is later thwarted by the blind mans nephew who walks in on him and panics. The creatures terrifying appearance causes society to reject him. These cultural responses create the monster that the creature becomes. Frankenstein's creature was not created as an evil monster, but rather was created innocent and then was transformed into a monster due to his cultural influences. He was created as a gentle and harmless creature without any knowledge that he was unwanted in the world. Soon he realized that he was a mistake and didn't fit in with the rest of society. Even his creator, a man who should have put as much work into him after bringing him to life as he did prior to bringing him to life, did not love him. The constant rejection and feeling of alienation received by the monster cause it to become destructive and evil.
By the monster’s actions Shelley clearly shows the major mistake that Victor had committed by playing the role of god and creating this hideous creature, furthermore letting it zoom in the world clueless. This shows how power can lead into disaster in anyone’s hands, because humans are not perfect and even with good intentions Victor still, made this huge mistake.
Animal Farm, however, is a classic portrayal of how power can affect the goals and hopes of a society. Orwell was careful in his designation of animals in Animal Farm, especially in regards to the power reserved for the pigs. Animal Farm uses the perfect combination of animal symbolism to relate the occurrences on Manor Farm to actual historical events of the Russian Revolution through the use of such characters as Napoleon, Snowball, Squealer, and Boxer. Napoleon is undoubtedly the most devout and corrupt character in the novel. His domineering and brutal methods of ruling the farm draw strange but clear comparison to his human counterpart Joseph Stalin. Napoleon is described as “a large, rather fierce-looking Berkshire boar, the only Berkshire on the farm, not much of a talker, but with a reputation for getting his own way” . He dominates the political scene on Manor Farm, controls the education of the youth, and is a brilliant strategist when it comes to rallying support for his cause.
I will explore the irony of Animal Farm, and how it used to satirize communism and dictatorships. The story begins with a revolution, and high hopes for the society being developed by the animals. But slowly, as the leading officials get a taste of power, things begin to change. The Commandments, a code by which all animals on Animal Farm live by, is secretly altered when the pigs (leading officials) begin to realize how great it is to live as a human being. Once they start drinking, “No animal may drink alcohol” soon becomes “No animal may drink alcohol to excess.” Like the prior reference, once the pigs begin sleeping in beds, “No animal shall sleep in a bed” becomes “No animal shall sleep in a bed with sheets.” These are crystal clear examples of the novel’s dynamic use of verbal irony.
The novel also has some good situational irony. A good example is when the pigs begin to walk, something that they vowed they would never do, or when they got drunk, again, something they vowed they would never do. In addition to verbal and situational irony, we can too find some dramatic irony. When Boxer is sent off to be slaughtered, the characters trust Squealer when he says Boxer is being taking off to a hospital, but the reader knows the truth. While that is a good example, the best, perhaps, is the ending where it is stated that the onlooker could not tell the difference between pig and man. The two most prominent themes in Animal Farm, freedom and oppression, play a very important role in the novel’s irony. While the animals’ ultimate goal is to break free from oppression, they ironically oppress themselves in the process. Here irony is used to show how lack of equality, no matter what the original intent was, can result in oppression.
Conclusions:
In both novels there was a person/animal who had an innocent dream that lead into revolution/research and then into power hungry and corruption!. Napoleon and Victor Frankenstein are very similar is this way, that they both corrupted with the power they had, even though their intentions might not have been bad they had made mistakes with the responsibility they carried. Napoleon was trusted by the animals to be a good leader and to free the animals from unnecessary labour so they only work to feed themselves, but Napoleon took advantage of the animals trust in him and bent the rules to suit his benefits.
In Frankenstein, however, Victor Frankenstein was fascinated by science. He had good education and so was very interested in changing the history of science, especially after the death of his mother that gave him the push to create live. He did not mean to create a monster, and he didn’t! As the creature was not monstrous at first when he was created but had developed hate and insanity from the surroundings that Victor left him in. Victor’s main mistake was not creating the monster but abandoning him alone in the world and neglecting his creation.
All in all as has been seen both of the novels explored the danger of having a dream and power that could lead to corruption. I think that both books have been very interesting and enjoyable. Animal farm was very easy to read with simple language and terms, however Frankenstein was more specific and descriptive as it is a much older book than Animal farm the use of language was quite different too. In my opinion Frankenstein was better written and was more interesting than Animal farm, may be because its fiction.