The Russian Revolution And George Orwell's Animal Farm

While George Orwell’s Animal Farm is best known as an expertly written allegory about the Russian Revolution of 1917 disguised as a humorous story about the Manor Farm it also criticizes both totalitarianism as well as communism as a whole. In Animal Farm, the animals working on Manor Farm have grown tired of working in conditions they deem as unfavorable and deplorable that their owner, Mr. Jones, has subjected them to. This hatred is conveyed and described early on in the novella during a speech Old Major gives to his fellow farm animals in chapter one stating, “our lives are miserable, laborious, and short… we are given
just so much food as will keep the breath in our bodies, and those of us 
who are capable of it are forced to work to
That is until they decided to take matters into their own hands, which Orwell playfully describes throughout the book. Other parallels made apparent between Animal Farm and the Russian Revolution include the building of the windmill, the pups Napoleon trained, and some of the characters themselves.

During the Russian Revolution, Joseph Stalin fought for something called the ‘Five-Year Plan,’ which is symbolized through the building of the windmill in Animal Farm. Both were meant to lessen the workload and therefor improve conditions for workers while increasing production, but as with Stalin’s ‘Five-Year Plan,’ the windmill was a complete failure. In Animal Farm, the characters Snowball and Napoleon argue over the construction of the windmill as Orwell explains in chapter five that, “as usual, Snowball and Napoleon were in 
disagreement,” which serves as a parallel between Joseph Stalin (portrayed as Napoleon) and Leon Trotsky (Snowball). Snowball was more about intellect and sought to stir rebellions in other neighboring farms seeing protection in numbers. Meanwhile,