Inspiration

I’m sure you’ve heard of the novel Animal Farm, right? If you haven’t read it you would have come across some reference to it somewhere in the popular media. It was written by George Orwell in the 1940s, also famous for his novel 1984.

Animal Farm was written at the dawn of the Cold War, at the end of world war two, and it basically allegories the rise of communism in Russia. The story stripped away the blanket of legitimacy Soviet propaganda used to cover up the sordid events and characters of the Russian communist revolution….because of that, Orwell had a hard time getting it published…the Russians were our allies against the Nazis, remember? The novel Animal Farm was itself preceded by an earlier animal-character novel, written in Polish by the Polish Nobel Prize winning novelist Wladyslaw Reymont in the 1920s, called Bunt (Rebellion). In both novels animals are seeking freedom from human tyranny.

Ok, so I read Animal Farm later in life, after high school. I was amazed. It’s simple, a fun read, clever and entertaining. Of course, its premise is now dated… the Cold War is long over. However, I was struck by the tame raven character, Moses, and his promises of a wonderous place in the clouds called “Sugarcandy Mountain”, to which all animals went when they died. In Sugarcandy Mountain it was Sunday seven days a week, clover was in season all the year round, and lump sugar and linseed cake grew on the hedges….the pigs had to argue very hard that there was no such place. It seems to me that Orwell built a ton of sarcasm into Moses and his tales, almost a tease to explore this further.

As I stated above, my main inspiration comes from religious extremism and environmental activism, heavily covered by our media. Not a day goes by without some headline about it. I’m old enough to remember that it never used to be this way. I’ve grown somewhat weary of it.

Be that as it may, perhaps I may be so bold as to state that this story captures “the defining spirit or mood of this particular period of history as shown by the ideas and beliefs of the time”. That’s the definition of Zeitgeist, by the way.

There is a little bit more that inspired my imagination to write this novel. I will elaborate in additional detail as I find the time to do so.

A.O.V, April 14, 2017