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View Full Version : Why did George Orwell write in a fable form?


Moira22100
09-30-2007, 05:06 PM
I'm just wondering for the sake of wondering, but why did Orwell write in a fable form, instead of writing about humans?

Thanks
Granny5
09-30-2007, 05:21 PM
I'm just wondering for the sake of wondering, but why did Orwell write in a fable form, instead of writing about humans?

Thanks

Maybe to reach a larger audience?
Moira22100
09-30-2007, 05:47 PM
Ahhh...yes...but is it anything deeper than that?
NickAdams
09-30-2007, 07:24 PM
Allegories help to disconnect those involved and allow them to judge the manifested material with out feeling they are being attacked.
Moira22100
09-30-2007, 07:33 PM
Thanks so much, that was exactly what I was looking for.
jfl
10-10-2007, 06:12 PM
The story was in fable type. Beacuse around the time it was published he could have gotten in trouble with the Russians. So he disguised it while attcking the Russian Government. We just talked about the story in World History
The Atheist
10-12-2007, 03:01 PM
The story was in fable type. Beacuse around the time it was published he could have gotten in trouble with the Russians. So he disguised it while attcking the Russian Government. We just talked about the story in World History

Nope, Orwell couldn't have cared less what the Russians thought. He knew that they'd know what he meant in AF anyway.

People were largely unaware of what was going on in Russia at that stage and the world had just finished a fairly major war, so having a book of facts on why a certain regime was so evil just wouldn't have worked. It basically creates another enemy just as one has been disposed of - not a popular move. Putting it in fable removes Russia as a threat to the reader.

I'm not sure I agree with Nick's answer as it applies to AF, either, Orwell was highly critical of Russia in many ways and I doubt he thought that many Russians would read it. Nick is right for many allegories, but for this one it only applies to maybe a small number of trade unionists.

It needs to be remebered that Orwell's target was both the intelligentsia who supported Stalin and the working man who supported communist-inspired trade unions. He wanted a book with universal appeal.