Aniaml Farm Essay

ANIMAL FARM
BY GEORGE ORWELL
Essay

Power is authority and strength, which is any form of energy, ability to act, or control. When too much power is given, a dictatorship government can form, in which all decisions are made by one authority. In the book Animal Farm, by George Orwell the author portrays how “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely”.
Old Major, who is a respected animal on the farm, had given a speech to stir the animal’s emotions into rebellion. He used his power of respect and trust to convince the others to follow the vision in his dream. “Old Major was so highly regarded on the farm that everyone was quite ready to lose an hour’s sleep in order to hear what he had to say”. Old Major’s dream was for the earth to be ruled by animals. Old Major strongly believed that animals have only one enemy. “Man is the only real enemy we have”. His speech inspired and energized his listeners. The power Old Major held led his friends into taking action in what he desired to do, which led to rebellion and future tragedies.
From the death of Old Major, Snowball, Napoleon, and Squealer replaced him. At first things started off pretty well, the harvest was very good the first year and the reading and writing education had helped some, but had small success on others. In time, the leaders of animal farm started to have mixed feelings. Snowball and Napoleon were in constant disagreement. An important meeting that was held ended with a bad outcome. One decision that was made was concerning the windmill project and the most important decision made was who would be the head animal. Snowball and Napoleon each gave their input on what needs to be done around the farm. “Snowball stood up and though occasionally interrupted by bleating from the sheep, set forth his reasons for advocating the building of the windmill. Then Napoleon stood up to reply. He said ver quietly that the windmill was a nonsense and that he advised nobody to vote for it”. At this time, Snowball jumped back up to convince the people that it was a good idea to build a windmill. Then Napoleon sent his dogs after snowball and they killed him. Since Snowball had died, Napoleon took over The Manor Farm which led to food shortage, hard labour, and deaths. He used his knowledge and education to take over the farm. With all the pigs and dogs on his side Napoleon had total power. The pigs were the brains of the farm and the dogs were the military force of the farm. Napoleon had complete control over the farm. Napoleon’s power ruined the whole idea of Animalism and The Seven Commandments, which the farm first started with. The power that the three pigs found had ruined them and, then Napoleon received total power, which ruined the society as a whole.
In conclusion, history has proven that power is the root of all evil in a communism style government or gathering. In Animal Farm, the animals tried to be equal, but in time, some animals had certain views and different opinions and some gradually became more powerful. No matter how hard in society we try, equality will never truly be reached by mankind for the reason that “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely”.