George Orwell Totalitarianism

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Eric Arthur Blair or better yet known by his pseudonym, George Orwell, was a talented man. He was many things, an English novelist, essayist, and critic. What he is best known for though is his satirical fiction writings, Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four. Expressing his strong opinions of the political movements that were happening at the time, which included imperialism, fascism, and communism. Orwell was an intellectual, a thinking man’s thinker and ultimately considered religion as a whole quite irrational and an institution that encouraged irrational thinking, which paved the way for the coercion of the masses (Kershaw). Orwell said: “As long as supernatural beliefs persist, men can be exploited by cunning priests and oligarchs, and the technical progress which is the prerequisite of a just society cannot be achieved.”(Kershaw). With the writings, he wanted to send a message to all the people and hopefully to change their lives. Believing that if he changed the minds of the people, the world could be a better and prosperous place. It all began in the year 1933 when George Orwell started his first major work, Down and Out in Paris and London, which showed Orwell’s …show more content…

Orwell tries to show how leaders, like Napoleon, can take over a revolution and turn it in to something that is meant only to help them personally. Most of the rest of the themes relate to this. A second theme is propaganda. We see Squealer use all sorts of techniques to fool the other animals into thinking that things are okay or to fool them into supporting Napoleon. A third theme is how various parts of a population respond to attempts to make a totalitarian government. Boxer, for example, tries his best to help the government, thinking Napoleon is always right. The pigs and dogs jump on Napoleon's bandwagon to get benefits for themselves. The hens resist, but only when it is too late and they get