Character Names
George Orwell authored Animal Farm as a parable, or a figurative representation of real life events. A number of the characters and the events in the book are meant to be symbolic, or representative, of actual participants in the Soviet Union and the Russian Revolution. Some of the animals who represent specific people or groups are:
- Jones: The aristocratic order, Russian Tsar
- Old Major: Vladimir Lenin and / or Karl Marx
- Napoleon: Joseph Stalin
- Snowball: Victor Trotsky
- Squealer: The media
- The group of pigs: Bureaucracy
- Moses the Raven: Religion
- Every other farm animal: The working class
The Windmill
The windmill symbolizes the large infrastructure projects and modern construction that the leaders of the Soviet Union introduced immediately following the end of the Russian revolution. As used in Animal Farm, the windmill is also called upon to represent the triumph of the pigs in creating a totalitarian state. All of the other farm animals worked diligently to build the structure, believing that is would ultimately benefit each of the farm’s inhabitants; however, in the end, it only benefited the pigs. Yet, even still, the animals continued to believe that it was beneficial for them.