Animal Farm, by George Orwell

The main purpose of satire is to attack, and intensely criticise the target subject. This is superbly carried out in the classic piece of satire, Animal Farm. The main targets at the brunt of this political satire are the society that was created in Russia after the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, and the leaders involved in it. George Orwell successfully condemns these targets through satirical techniques such as irony, fable, and allegory. The immediate object of attack in Orwell's political satire is the society that was created in Russia after the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917. The events narrated in Animal Farm obviously and continuously refer to events in another story, the history of the Russian Revolution. In other words, Animal Farm is not only a charming fable ("A Fairy Story," as Orwell playfully subtitles it) and a bitter political satire; it is also an allegory. The main target of this allegory is Stalin, represented by Napoleon the pig. He represents the human frailties of any revolution. Orwell believed that although socialism is a good ideal, it could never be successfully adopted due to uncontrollable sins of human nature. For example, although Napoleon seems at first to be a good leader, he is eventually overcome by greed and soon becomes power-hungry. Of course Stalin did too in Russia, leaving the original equality of socialism behind, giving him all the power and living in luxury while the common pheasant suffered. Orwell explains: “Somehow it s...