Animal Farm

Animal Farm - Karl Marx

Is based on the work of the German
Philosopher Karl Marx

Karl Marx was a
German
Philospher

Ms F Grech - Form 3

“The worker becomes all the poorer the more wealth he produces, the more his production increases in power and range...” 1

Animal Farm - Karl Marx

“The worker becomes an ever cheaper commodity the more commodities he creates...”

What does this mean?
A useful or valuable thing

Karl Marx was talking about Capitalism.

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...that Capitalists exploit the workers or proletariat. ...that the proletariat are exploited by being made to work hard in return for minial pay.
...that the proletariat never see the rewards of their own labour.

an economic and political system where a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit rather than by the government or citizens for the greater good of everybody. Ms F Grech - Form 3

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Animal Farm - Karl Marx

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that the only way this would stop was if the proletariat revolted against the capitalists...

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Major states that the life of the animals is one of
‘misery and slavery’
Why?
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Because the animals are exploited by man who consumed without producing
Because animals are not rewarded for what they do

...in other words, if the lower classes rebelled against the upper classes.

Orwell makes the reader sympathetic to this
Marxist argument by listing the ways in which man makes the animals suffer.
According to Major:
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Ms F Grech - Form 3

‘No animal in England is free’
The only solution is to rebel against man
There should be ‘perfect unity’
‘All animals are comrades’
The animals should NEVER behave like man

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Serves as a benchmark by which to judge the pigs’ subsequent actions.
The chapters that follow show how the principles of Animalism are then distorted and corrupted. the philosophy of
Old Major

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