Education
Animal Farm - Episode #1 - Meet George Orwell and the array of world forces that produced this classic work! Hi, I’m Christy Shriver. And I’m Garry Shriver, and this is the How to Love Lit Podcast. Today we start another political tale- this time instead of a play written two-thousand years, ago, we will discuss a novel, well officially it’s a novel, but its author called it a fairy-tale, albeit without the prince charming, beautiful princess and the happily ever after ending. I’m not sure how it’s a fairy tale at all, actually. HA! Yes, Orwell was very careful with his words and that bit of satirical language sets the tone for what’s to come in this strangely inspirational scary yet playful warning about the dangers of power and totalitarianism. And speaking about Orwell calling it a fairy tale- the American publisher omitted that title in the American edition a year after it was written and after that so did everyone else- I’m really not sure why. ,It’s an obvious fable that works on several levels. First, it’s a charming story about talking animals- and it works so well on that level and written so simply that there are libraries who mistakenly put it in the juvenile section of the library. And in some sense it is simple and that makes it a relief to read. I saw in a survey done by the Independent newspaper of Great Britain that it is THE most popular book adults remember from their school days- even beats out The Great Gatsby, Charlottes’s Webb and lord of the flies- and if I were to guess, and I will, I have a feeling, that’s because most of the books we make kids read have complicated vocabulary, old fashioned syntax and are just exhausting. Animal Farm is none of that. It has a simplicity of form that makes it simple to navigate- but if you read it ONLY in that way- you are making a grave mistake. It’s not the same as the jungle book or Beatrix Potter. It’s a biting satire about Soviet Totalitarianism as well as an important allegory on basic human nature- what people are really like- and exposing complicated people as simply as he did is where the genius rests- We should never mistake simplicity of form with simplicity of ideas- and an oversimplification of this story makes you the gullible fools he’s writing about and warning you not to be. Another point mentioning is that this book has been controversial from before it was published. Orwell finished the manuscript to Animal Farm in 1943 but it wasn’t published until August 1945 by a company called Secker & Warburg. Frederic Warburg published the book despite his wife threatening to leave him if he did publish it. It was horrifying to publish a book so openly mocking the Russians who were our allies in WW2 and had lost so many men in the fight against Hitler. The book came out literally the same month in which the atomic bomb hit Hiroshima and Nagasaki- and although no one would have known it at the time- there’s a bit or irony to think about the fact that the Manhattan Project, an effort basically committed to figuring out how to blow up the world, was literally going on at the exact same time Orwell was writing this warning about the political scenario that would lead to such a disaster- anyway- despite his wife’s protestations, Warburg published the book and the 4,500 copies he printed sold out in just a few days. Nine million copies were sold by 1973 and Warburg gained popularity from his connection to Animal Farm. The fact that the everyone knew the book would be controversial only made them want to read it more. Even after WWII and the book’s obvious success there has still been some opposition to it in the classroom, although nothing like of mice and men or Huck Finn. In the sixties in Wisconsin the book was challenged because of its phrases about revolution, and people were afraid this would cause public revolt .At the same time in New York, there was opposition because Orwell was a socialist and they did not want to teach a book thought to be written by a communist. But in the end, it has been hailed in free countries as a great exposition of communism, and it’s banned in countries where control of free thought is government policy. Animal Farm is still banned in Cuba, Kenya, and the United Arab Emirates according to the American Library Association. Only a censored version is read in China and the book was banned in Russia from 1945 until the 1980’s. Of course, on the other side of this issue, and this is kind of funny- Animal Farm is the only book I know of that the CIA actually funded, In the 1950s, the CIA actually paid to have an animated version of this book distributed around the world. It does seem that that this unassuming “fairy tale”does ruffle feathers- it can’t be ignored. There is a lot to say about the different ways to approach this book. First we must look at it in its original historical context, the politics of Russia, Spain, the 1940s, etc…this is how Orwell intended it to be understood. He is even quoted as saying this is the “first book in which he tried, with full consiciousness to fuse political purpose with artistic purpose.” He wanted to expose the Soviets for the “pigs” he thought them from his first-hand experiences with them in Spain. He said there was a lie he wanted to expose and a fact he wanted to draw attention to. However even people who really don’t care about politics or history find a way to enjoy and understand the warning Orwell gives us because it IS art- even if it’s not he complex intense drama of any other philosophical novel. It has inspired at least two movies, it is referenced in or inspired songs by everyone from hip-hop duo Dead Prez to satirical post-punks Half Man Half Biscuit, with Radiohead, R.E.M. and Pink Floyd. It is art because his ideas far outlive Stalinism, so while we will definitely draw all the connections between Napoleon and Stalin and Boxer and the proletariat and Mr. Jones and the Czars, we will also draw out the more modern and timeless parallels as well. but first- as we always do- let’s look at the unusual man who left us this bitterly humorous fable. George Orwell was not born George Orwell,but Eric Arthur Blair on January 23 in 1903 to a minor official to the Indian Customs in Bengal, India. He was the middle child, and according to the way Orwell later described his family life his family’s economic situation was “the lower-upper-middle class”. What does that mean “lower-upper-middle class”? It sounds like he’s trying to be precise, but he’s thrown all the classes into one hyphenated expression in what we would simply call “lower upper class” or “upper middle class”. Yes, I think that’s what we would probably be say, but he didn’t like this position in society and he seemed to feel lower at some level- so I guess that’s why that word is included in the designation. I think we, as Americans in the 21st century, really cannot understand the power of the British class system because we have never had anything close. Wehave no Barons or Marques or Counts or Dukes or Lords or anything of the kind, but it really did heavily influence how George Orwell, or Eric Blair, if you go by his real name, felt about himself and how he felt about his place in the world around him. In some sense, he’s owning the fact that he had a financially privileged upbringing compared to many worldwide and that he cannot deny is a huge part of who he was. But he also wants to claim that his privilege was not the sort of privilege one could really enjoy as a spoiled rich kid or a Downton Abby character. It’s something like this- and this is how I interpret his experience, his parents were rich enough to be able to struggle to afford him an opportunity to go to really fancy prep schools (and that is a huge privilege), but when he got there, he was the “scholarship kid”. So, his father was in India, his mother brought him back to England (a divided family- not a privilege) and he attended really nice schools (privilege), he was in with all the rich kids (privilege), but he was the outsider. He could never be one of them (not a privilege). I know- you’re probably saying to yourself-whn whn whn- so you’re complaining about not being rich enough- boohoo- and there is truth to that- he wouldn’t say there wasn’t- but there is legitimacy and I feel sympathy when I read how he felt about himself. I read this- and this is him describing himself, “I had no money. I was weak. I was ugly, I was unpopular. I had a chronic cough, I was cowardly, I smelt.” To me that’s horrible, and of course, every child in some sense only sees their own faults- adults are like that too-but of all those problems, having no money topped his list of problems- and the irony there is tremendous- if you’re writing this while sitting at Eton or any other expensive finishing school-but this is not a problem regular middle class kids face. Middle class kids have money problems because they want a car and have to pay for the insurance themselves, or they want clothes their parents can’t afford- but everyone around them is struggling in a similar fashion- so it’s not the struggle for money that you would identify as your most identifying characteristic- everyone in your class at school has the same issue. For example, in my school, which is a blue color public school- if one kids wants to brag about being something or having a little more than everyone else- someone can always say-= hey, well, you’re here at Bartlett High with the rest of us- which means- whoever you think you are- you’re still one of us. It wasn’t that way for Eric Blair He did NOT feel one of “us”. And in the British class system, he really wasn’t. Well, as far as academics go, he wasn’t the underperformer he claimed to be. By age 13 he was chosen to receive not one, but TWO scholarships, one was the prestigious King’s scholarship to what is arguably the most prestigious and famous high school on planet earth, Eton- the boarding school that educated Prince Harry, Prince William and Boris Johnson (to name a few of its alumni that are influencial today). It’s a nice opportunity- and although, I don’t feel tremendous amounts of sympathy for him, I do acknowledge that it did make him keenly aware of this idea of haves and have nots and the arbitrary and sometimes unfair rules of the universe used to determined one from the other. As an adult writing about his teenage experiences, Orwell said that he didn’t exactly make the most of his time at Eton. He didn’t even finish. He “slacked there” to use his words and left in December of 1921 after only three years and change. He passed the entrance exam and joined the Indian Imperial Police and was accepted into the Burma division. So. Like his father, back he went to the East. He stayed in Burma for five years, and what we know about his experiences there are what he wrote in two famous essays. “Shooting an Elephant” which is one of my favorite essays ever, and a book he titled Burmese Days that was published in 1934 in NY. What we can gather from these books, and why this even matters when we talk about Animal Farm is essentially this- Orwell, was absolutely revolted about what he saw from being a member of the colonial class. He felt that how he was enforcing the law in Burma was not fair, and what they were doing by definition was cruelty; he thought to inflict colonial rule upon a separate people was oppressive. And even though he did what he was supposed to do, He felt guilty for injustices Colonialism perpetuated on massive amounts of undeserving people. So, in a sense, as a child he felt he was on oppressed side of things- and he didn’t like that, but he didn’t like being an oppressor on the other side of things either. When he left Burma in 1927 and he said this in an article he titled “How I became a Socialist”, “I was already half-determined to throw up the job, and one snuff of English air decided me. I was not going back to be part of that evil depotism.” His response to all of that inner-turmoil really does depict a man who is trying to sort out the right way honest men should live in relation to each other- and it is in that spirit that his interest in socialism and communism was born- and so- he takes another step in figuring out the political answer- and I guess in some sort of admission that he really had lived a privileged life- He went to live on the streets of Paris and then London mainly as a homeless person, although there were periods where he got jobs, as a dishwasher or tutor or other odds and ends types of things. It seems he wanted to experience life as poorly as it could possibly be lived and for a man who’s health had already been wrecked by life in Burma, this was not a really healthy choice. The end result professionally was not bad however- he was able to walk away from his homelessness days with his first published book, Down and Out in paris and London, in 1933- maybe that was worth the literal starvation he subjected himself to. The book didn’t sell well, but it was well-received by critics, and so it kind of set him on this literary journey where he would pursue and receive some sort of respectability which led him to writing other things, but personally, he decided to settle down, buy a cottage and most importantly find a woman to love, Eileen O’Shaughnessy. Orwell was not going to stay settled long. World events took over. The Spanish Civil War was going on, and Orwell and his wife wanted to get in the mix. It was his experiences in the Spanish Civil War that were really going to define his political views. He was a Republican volunteer against Franco. But Orwell was present in Barcelona when Soviet Sponsored hit squads were taking down the Trostky Marxist Workers Party militia, where he was assigned. So, to put this another way- Franco was supposed to be the bad guy because Franco was a fascist dictator kind of like Mussolini or Hitler. The Communists were supposed to be fighting that, but Orwell saw that they had their own agenda actually in spite of what they SAID they were doing. In all of this, Orwell got shot in his throat, and missed having his carotid artery severed by millimeters according to Spanish doctors. For two months he couldn’t speak at all, and one of his vocal cords was paralyzed forever which altered the way he talked for the rest of his life. In his time in Spain, he saw first hand the ruthlessness and treachery of the communists. He had been so concerned up to this point in his life with class and money- but this war told a different story. Things were more complicated than that. He had really thought that his dream of building a world where his three core values of liberty, equality and fraternity would have a chance to flourish would find a home with the Russians. And in Spain, he saw the painful truth about the Russians specifically, but really about all humans, that he’s going to illustrate in animal farm. He begins to understand that people will most certainly betray each other for power. They will lie. They will deceive. But, on the other hand, he also made genuine friends and found people who loved each other and sacrificed for each other. I like this quote where he says, “This war has left me with memories which are mostly evil, and yet I do not wish that I had missed it…curiously enough, the whole experience has left me with not less but more belief in the decency of human beings.” Well, his non-fiction piece Homage to Catalonia is highly regarded as an objective narrative of that war, but at the time, no one really wanted to read it. It’s gotten more popular over the years, but really mostly with history buffs. Again world events bigger than Orwell are going to define everything. WW2 began and everyone wanted to fight Hitler, except Orwell can’t fight because of his horrible health and his war injury. He does work in the war effort as a journalist, and even though at first he really believes WW2 has the potential to bring in some sort of socialist social change for the better, by the time Animal Farm is written in 1943, his political views are formed and his opinion on the Soviet experiment are decidedly unkind to say the least. One fun fact that is a little ironic is that he finished writing the book in 1943 in London while bombs were falling on that town and in fact one bomb even damaged the manuscript of the book because it fell on the street where Orwell and his wife lived. And here’s where I want us to camp out for a few minutes because I think it’s helpful to take a look at the world in the 20th century. Here is a young man, a good man, an idealistic man, who seems to really have a strong sense of fairness from his earliest days. He seems to have observed what we call “hiearchy”, seen unfairness in it, and wants to make a world where good people are rewarded and respected and bad people and held in check. Yes, but living through the 20th century really is going challenge the idea that a world like this is even possible. Let’s look at what’s going on- first we have the problem of colonialism- (talk about that) then we have Hitler to come on the scene (talk about this) -then we have Franco (talk about this) and finallhy we have the Russian Czars, The bolsheveik revolution and then Stalin (talk about this) The common thread that orwell seems to have connected between all of these is that tyrants emerge. There exists people in this world who want to rule, dominate and oppress others- this is a deeper problem than economics: socialism vs capitalism- It’s a problem of human nature. And Language is used to deceive. The English author Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1839 said this, “the pen is mightier than the sword”. And Orwell shows us thast that is certainly true. It can be true in a good way, in the sense that Winston Churchill motivated the British to defeat Hitler or how football coaches use words to inspire their players to win championships, but it can also be used in evil ways- and that’s how its used in this book. The language of “brotherhood” camaraderie, equality, fraternity are used to deceive people into giving up control of their lives- and this will all be done nicely at first, but when the noose is in place and words have left one group entirely vulnerable than, as he saw in Barcelona, violence emerges with no mercy. Orwell will tell a story where there is a dream of a world that is fair and peaceful. This dream is fleshed out by an inspirational leader, but after his death, the ones in charge of carrying the dream are entrenched in corruption. They realize that they are in charge of the storehouse of resources and they keep them all for themselves. So, I think that’s enough background on Orwell. I do want to tell the story of the end of his life, but we can do that in a different episode. Are we ready to start the book? Are we ready to hear this amazing dream of a Utopian world? Yes- let’s start the book- Christy, will you read for us the first few pages, as we usually do in every book? Of course, but I will say, this book, being a fairy tale, does not give away its theme so clearly as we see in other books like the Scarlet letter of Of Mice and Men. What Orwell wants to do in the first few pages of this book is catch us off guard. He wants us to be drawn into this beautifully deceptive world of talking animals and lightheartedness, so the power of his irony and the bitterness of our deception is more powerfully felt when the time comes. The part I really want to read is the the very very first, although I’ll set that up, but I want to read the Utopian dream. We can talk about this set up as long as we want but then you can say Next week, we will meet the characters and find out who they are in real life- we will tell the story of the real Mr. Jones, who was this guy, who is Old Major, if he’s even one person and take a closer look at life on Manor Farm and figure out who they were supposed to be in real life!!