As the line between reality and fiction becomes increasingly ambiguous, we turn to the people we met in books for guidance. The best novels create characters to idolize and to revile. Such characters outlive their authors, holding profound messages for their readers. Classic novels, in the form of 1984, Animal Farm, and Fahrenheit 451, exemplify this idea, utilizing characters as a code of ethics for the reader to examine. In Animal Farm, by George Orwell, we are invited to the “Manor Farm,” populated by alarmingly intelligent animal revolutionaries who succeed in their campaign to overthrow their owner. Gradually, we witness the farm, rechristened “Animal Farm,” as it declines into hierarchic divisions between its inhabitants. The pigs, occupying the top rung of society, become indistinguishable from the oppressors they overcame, their goodwill…show more content… Winston, under the constant gaze of “Big Brother,” lives bereft of “peace,” “freedom,” and “strength.” I sympathize with his rebellion against the party, however, Orwell makes Winston’s character flaws increasingly apparent in the book’s progression. He is swiftly radicalized by the false promise of rebellion against the party, prepared to match their atrocities in opposition. When questioned by O’Brien, he agrees, in turn, that he is willing to give his own life, to commit murder, to aid in actions which contribute to the deaths of innocent citizens, to betray his country, to commit suicide, and to throw acid in the face of a child for the sake of rebellion, an exchange later used by the party to refute the assertion of his moral superiority to them. Orwell maintains that extremism is unjust under any guise, an idea with which I agree strongly; radical actions are what made the swine, in Animal Farm, into the very monsters they usurped. Winston’s story edified me to reject strict idealogues which blind common people to
