Monday, September 9, 2019

What does Napoleon promise the animals?

Napoleon, described as "a large, rather fierce-looking Berkshire boar," is one of the pigs we encounter in Animal Farm. He has a reputation for getting his own way and in fact quickly manages to get rid of his most relevant rival, Snowball. He becomes a dictator, effectively establishing a tyranny on the farm.
Napoleon is cunning, treacherous, and conniving. Sometimes he uses force and violence to get his own way (for example, when he has Snowball chased out of the farm by his dogs), but other times he is more subtle and disturbing.
He brainwashes the animals, making promises but failing to honor these promises. For example, one driving force in Animal Farm is food, which the animals never get enough of while Mr. Jones is head of the farm. When the animals complain of the amount of food they are receiving, Napoleon tells them that he is actually giving them more food than was ever given to them in the past by Mr. Jones. In reality, he is keeping most of the food for the pigs and conceding extremely limited rations to the other animals, who go along with this because they believe Napoleon's lies and are willing to make sacrifices for the farm; they are also convinced that the pigs are making sacrifices too, by eating food they don't enjoy such as apples.
Napoleon also promises prosperity, freedom, more riches and a comfortable life; however, a few years after the rebellion, we learn that the pasture which was promised for retirement was actually never put aside and, in fact, no animal has ever retired. All the animals have done is work, while the pigs and dogs do nothing.
Snowball was a much better leader and actually seems to care about the animals and their wellbeing, but he is used as the scapegoat for every setback which the farm goes through. Snowball has also come up with plans to build a windmill in order to provide electricity. Napoleon, once Snowball is out of the way, also promises electricity, but once the windmill is finished, it is then used to mill corn in order to generate profit. Napoleon, the other pigs, and the dogs do not work. Despite this, he insists that "the truest happiness lies in working hard and living frugally."
In the end, the animals are left with empty promises and the famous unsettling maxim which reads, "ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL / BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS."

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