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Summary: This was an O.K. Book.
Review: I enjoyed reading this book, sort of. It was really hard to follow, especially in the middle. I wouldn't reccomend it. The only reason I read ot was because I had to for Reading class. I guess the book is really meant for adults. If you were older, then you might understand more of the symbolism and stuff like that. (I am only 13). Let's just say, I wouln't reccomend it to anyone under, lets say 14 or 15.
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Summary: Animal Farm
Review: I remember reading this book as a child, and taking it on face value as a story about some animals who took over a farm. As children's stories go this is quite realistic. I had no idea that I was reading a literary classic. I think in many ways this gave an impact and fascination to reading the story as a teenager, and discovering it's deeper levels, that I would otherwise not have experienced. Orwell's linguistic philosophy, less is more, makes this book accessible to the upper end of the Junior School. For this reason I have decided to include it in my folder. The story, in case you didn't know, involves a farm, Manor Farm. I always imagined it was in Cornwall, but I guess I did grow up there. The farmer treats the all the animals badly, except for the dogs of course. The animals, lead by the pigs - being supposedly the most intelligent farm animal, revolt and take over the farm. The animals decide to redefine the boundaries of what a farm can be. To make farm where everyone is equal, where everyone does just what he can and receives just what he needs. Animal Farm. There is a power struggle between the two leading pigs Napoleon and Snowball. Snowball is chased out of the farm, never to return. From then on the farm gradually descends into a familiar pattern of the oppressed and the oppressors. By the end of the book we are asking ourselves what has changed from when the humans ran the farm. He looked from man to pig, and from pig to man. But already it was impossible to tell which was which. I would assume that you know that the book is a parable of the Russian Revolution, and of revolutions in general. It is quite specific in comparisons. Napoleon and Snowball represent Stalin and Trotsky. Squealer represents the media. Boxer is the uneducated but committed peasant, and the burning of his hat is the destruction of much of that would have been useful to the revolution. I could go on but I shan't. I would be surprised if many 9 year olds pick up on this alternative level of comprehension, and even more surprised if they were interested if it was pointed out to them. The book taken literally however has a lot to offer children. It deals with themes with which they are all familiar. Trust and betrayal. Fear, bullying, anger. Right and wrong. Justice and injustice. The same questions can be asked of the book, but without realising the comparison with the Russian Revolution. Just because thing didn't work out, did that make the animals wrong to revolt in the first place? Could things have turned out differently, or were thing bound to turn out as they did? Above all else though Animal farm is a well written, well told story, which many children would enjoy.
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Summary: A book for all to read!
Review: A lot of the things I treasure about the book have already been said, but a big issue to me in the book, was how it so accurately portrayed through metaphores, the exact way things in history happened! It definitely makes you stare at it in a different light, since rather than being a part of it (well, part of the human race), your looking down at it all. "Ignorance is bliss...", a quote I've heard many people say to me. This book proves that quote wrong though. All the animal followers of the pigs, do not have minds for themselves! Communism couldn't have gotten as far as it had, if people had just thought for themselves, and hadn't had the attitude of especially Boxer who would always say, "Napolean is always right.". They just accepted their rules and their commandments. Most of the animals could not read either, which became a major problem when it came to the way the rules were made. This was one point I thought it portrayed greatly...the importance of education...if we are ignorant and just go along with whatever the speaker/leader is talking about (when Snowball was still there, it was said that the animals always seemed to believe whoever was talking at the time), then things like this are pronned to happen.
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Summary: Ludicrously fictictional yet fun to read.
Review: George Orwell's novel was in fact an expression of his views towards totalitarianism, i.e. a satire. However because the storyline was so insanely bizarre in and of itself, it became impossible for the reader to tell when the events of the novel had an underlying message and when they didn't. It was easy to pick up, and the anctics of the animals made it a book that the reader wanted to finish, but Orwell's subtly expressed views of totalitarianism were totally overshadowed and ignored as the reader incessantly wonders, " Am I missing something here?"
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Summary: Perfectly argued, but one minor flaw
Review: Animal Farm is a perfectly argued description of how revolutions decay and are corrupted. The pigs (the Russian Communist Party)gradually and logically become worse than the inefficient old oppressors. The flaw I see is that Orwell was still seeing Communism as a "revolution betrayed", not as something unavoidably and intrinsicly wrong and doomed - as I think T.S. Eliot said, it is almost as if Orwell believed the problem might have been solved by more public-spirited pigs. But despite this criticism, Animal Farm is not only a great book, written in a perfect and limpid style, but essential reading for understanding our world and the history of the Twentieth Century, as well as a timeless warning.
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Summary: George Orwell¿s Animal Farm
Review: is the story of a revolution betrayed, a paradise substituted, and an ideal shattered. Old Major's fiery speech inspires and defines the animals' revolution. He hopes that one-day they will live in a communal society run by the animals for the animals. In the society that forms after the revolution, Napoleon (who represents Stalin or any leader like him) achieves absolute power. Napoleon and the other pigs distort Old Major's dream, changing the original concept from doctrine (Animalism), to "unalterable law" (the Seven Commandments), to slogans (Four Legs Good, Two Legs Bad). By the end of the book, the reverse of what Major originally intended occurs. Animal Farm testifies to the power of language to change and control society, for both good and ill. Major first uses language to free the animals; Napoleon then uses it to enslave them. The wrongs that Major denounces in his speech, the pigs eventually commit, using distorted forms of his views to back up their actions. Napoleon gains power through the twisting of language and the rewriting of history in order to control the future. As the language that defines the ideals of Animal Farm is distorted, so is the reality, revealing that power over language is power over reality.
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Summary: Among my favorite books ever written.
Review: Problably the best book I ever read. The truth of communism is exposed in a genieus way, one that has never been done before. It used animals to portray the communist people. Nothing is more true than "all animals are equal.... but some are more equal than otheres". I think it goes like that.
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Summary: Mandatory reading...
Review: 'Animal Farm' is a fairy tale of sorts, a modern allegory on modern happenings, yet told in a fantastic and unbelievable way. No, instead of political commentary or essays, or fiction that is apparent, Orwell chose the realm of fantasy to make his points on Socialism and the human way. Not sword and sorcery fantasy, but rather that classic mode of storytelling that works so well, in which non-humans take up the role as humans, showing us who we are while remaining distant from our image. Facinating through and through.And you get all that in less than 100 pages.
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Summary: Just Awesome!
Review: Animal Farm turned what was one of the most significant events in this century and put it into a story even a 5th grader could understand while maintaining every bit of historical integrity. Even if you have no interest in the Russian Revolution, you WILL be awed at the simple prose in which Orwell writes to convey one of the most complex problems of our time
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Summary: One of the most influential novels of the 20th century.
Review: George Orwell is the pseudonym of Eric A. Blair (1903-1950). He published this short political satire in the mid-1940s and it was required reading for many students when I was in high school in the early 1960s. I even discovered that it was required reading for eighth graders in one of the local schools just this last year. It is still having an impact. This classic fable of animals who take over a farm is a satire of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution and of Communist rule in the Soviet Union. Since the U.S.S.R. has now broken up, one might feel that this book is now outdated. However, I think that is far from the case. First of all, the book is a part of history. The satire has had an influence on the world's perception of this form of government (and on any form of totalitarianism). Thus, in a way, the novel has played a role, perhaps minor, in the ultimate fate of the Soviet Union. In addition, I find many instances in politics, in other totalitarian governments, and even in personal interactions in business and in academia that can be perceived in a new light through this fable. In the tale, the animals on Mr. Jones's farm revolt and oust their human master. In the beginning, all the animals have a deep revolutionary zeal and all attempt to work for the common good. A list of Commandments is formulated that all are to follow. But, the pigs, led by a pig named Napoleon, begin to take over the leadership and begin to edit the Commandments for their. They subvert the Revolution for their own ends and for the sake of power. A new tyranny has replaced the old. The downtrodden remain the downtrodden. The pig Napoleon represents the ruthless Stalin and the idealistic Snowball represents Trotsky. The doomed horse Boxer represents the characteristics of the common man. But, as mentioned above, the book brings up issues that go far beyond that of the 1917 revolution. Perhaps the most famous line is "All the animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others." An earlier reviewer gave the book only a single star, using this line as an example of how the book was so "dumb" since how could things be more equal than others. Of course, that was Orwell's point but it seems to still elude some of our young critics. This is a book that everyone should read and it is incumbent that teachers get some of Orwell's points across. There are some reviewers who gave the book a single star simply because it wasn't realistic in that Orwell used animals as characters. It is as if these students had never heard of satire, imagery, allegory, or metaphor. Thank goodness that most of the students writing comments do not fall into that category.
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