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George Orwell's timeless and timely allegorical novel—a scathing satire of a downtrodden society's blind march towards totalitarianism.
"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."
A farm is taken over by its overworked, mistreated animals. With flaming idealism and stirring slogans, they set out to create a paradise of progress, justice, and equality. Thus the stage is set for one of the most telling satiric fables ever penned—a razor-edged fairy tale for grown-ups that records the evolution from revolution against tyranny to a totalitarianism just as terrible.
When Animal Farm was first published, Stalinist Russia was seen as its target. Today it is devastatingly clear that wherever and whenever freedom is attacked, under whatever banner, the cutting clarity and savage comedy of George Orwell's masterpiece have a meaning and message still ferociously fresh.
What are your favorite books about animals, both fiction and nonfiction?
Misty of Chincoteaguu (Marguerite Henry), Charlotte's Web (E.B. White), The Horse Whisperer (Nicholas Evans), Seabiscuit-An American Legend (Lauren Hillenbrand), Remarkably Bright Creatures (Shelby Van Pelt), My Beloved Monster- the Half-Wild Rescue Cat Who Saved Me (Caleb Carr), Born Free (Joy A...
-Vivian_H
What's your favorite banned book?
...book because of offensive language, teach it as Twain's commentary on race relations and the relationship developed between Huck & Jim. Next: 1984 & Animal Farm by George Orwell. Censorship is the first step towards totalitarianism.
-Vivian_H
"As lucid as glass and quite as sharp...[Animal Farm] has the double meaning, the sharp edge, and the lucidity of Swift." —Atlantic Monthly
"A wise, compassionate, and illuminating fable for our times." —New York Times
"Orwell has worked out his theme with a simplicity, a wit, and a dryness that are close to La Fontaine and Gay, and has written in a prose so plain and spare, so admirably proportioned to his purpose, that Animal Farm even seems very creditable if we compare it with Voltaire and Swift." —The New Yorker
This information about Animal Farm was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
George Orwell (pseudonym for Eric Blair [1903-50]) was born in Bengal and educated at Eton; after service with the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, he returned to Europe to earn his living penning novels and essays. He was essentially a political writer who focused his attention on his own times, a man of intense feelings and intense hates. An opponent of totalitarianism, he served in the Loyalist forces in the Spanish Civil War. Besides his classic Animal Farm, his works include a novel based on his experiences as a colonial policeman, Burmese Days, two firsthand studies of poverty, Down and Out in Paris and London and The Road to Wigan Pier, an account of his experiences in the Spanish Civil War, Homage to Catalonia; and the extraordinary novel of political prophecy whose title became part of our language, 1984.
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