Old Major vs. Karl Marx (Q2: 1)

Quote: "'Now, comrades, what is the nature of this life of ours? Let us face it: our lives are miserable, laborious, and short...'" (18) 

This is part of the speech given by Old Major at the beginning of the story, he is laying the foundations for Animalism and extolling the miseries of their current lives. I chose this quote because the speech given here is the foundation upon which the story is built, and also the beginning of the allegorical nature of Animal Farm.

Analysis: Animal Farm is well known as an allegory for lots of communist uprisings, specifically the Russian Revolution. Many of the characters have an almost one-to-one correspondence to people in history, especially Soviets. Old Major, for one, is analogous to Karl Marx, whose philosophies, collectively known as Marxism, were the basis for Communism. Marx wrote and advocated for the proletariat, and also saw his ideas perverted into a way to control the people. Old Major, however, died before that occurred, and was unable to speak against it as Marx did.