Napoleon's Power In Animal Farm By George Orwell

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"The greater the power, the more dangerous the abuse." (Edmund Burke). This relates to Napoleon, (a selfish pig) who uses his power to take control of the other animals by putting them to work, while he sits around and does nothing. The novel Animal Farm by George Orwell is a social criticism/allegory to the Russian Revolution. In the novel, the animals, led by pigs revolt against an ignominious farm owner Mr. Jones in attempt to take control. One pig, Snowball takes over and tries to turn the farm into a utopia with guidelines to prevent animals from ever becoming like man, but he's chased out by a power hungry pig, Napoleon. Napoleon then turns into the tyrant of the farm taking all the power from himself, which leads to the animals falling…show more content…
Napoleon and the other pigs changed the 7 commandments to one single commandment since they want to take total control because they have experienced power and now want more of it. The result of this is now the animals are starting to realize they are ruled under a dictator, but they still believe that the pigs should be superior to them. "All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others." (Page 136). Since Napoleon is afraid of losing his power, he wants the animals to realize that he has all the power. He has done this by creating a hierarchy on the farm. He created two groups upper class (privileged) and lower class (poor). Lower class being the average animal on the farm, having to work brutal hours getting little to no reward. The upper class would be the pigs, supervising the other animals while taking all the luxuries for themselves. Napoleon is doing this because he wants more power so that he won't lose his dignity in the long run. This is significant since when a selfish leader experience power and liked it so much that he continues to want more control, because he is afraid of losing his
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