Comparing 2 Characters From Animal Farm To Their Historical Figures
Napoleon ---> Stalin
In the film Animal Farm Joseph Stalin was portrayed through the character Napoleon, a pig. Stalin was the dictator of the USSR for 25 years. Just like Napoleon he was very superstitious of others overpowering him. He was known to be a very cruel leader and anyone who refused to cooperate with him was executed. Millions of people were executed as a result. In Animal Farm Old Major wanted to make some changes to how the Farm worked. He believed that animals were right and that humans were evil and cruel beings. However before he could make any drastic changes he unfortunately died due to falling from a high platform. So when he died Napoleon emerged as the new leader. He was, just like Stalin, a dictator. He decided that meetings will not be continued and that the pigs will make all the decisions. Like Stalin, he did not let his people take part in voting.
Snowball, whose historical figure is Trotsky, gets banished for his ideas just like Trotsky did. Napoleon got rid of Snowball after an argument on whether a windmill should be built or not. When George Orwell linked Napoleon to Stalin’s violence through training puppies to be his soldiers, this further increases the impact it has on the victim than if Napoleon had chosen any other animal. Napoleon also blamed Snowball when there was no food, saying that he stole it all. Napoleon was using every chance he could to persuade the people to follow him and he was always making himself look good and hiding away the truth just like Stalin used to do.
The Hens ---> Peasants
The Hens in Animal Farm were like the peasants in Russia. They were very poor and were a burden on their leaders. They had no say in any rule making and were forced to do stuff. Like in Animal Farm, Napoleon told the Hens they must give up their precious eggs. This is a reference to Stalin's attempt to take all the peasant farmers crops and animals. The Hens wouldn't agree to this and soon smashed all their eggs up so Napoleon couldn't take them. Upon hearing what happened, Napoleon decided to take action towards this and ordered everyone to not give food to the hens. However a lot of animals didn't know about this as Napoleon was hiding this and many other things from his animals.
The hen’s historical figures are the peasants. When Stalin asked the peasants to hand over all their crops and animals, the peasants became very furious about this sudden demand and destroyed all their cops and killed most of their animals so Stalin wouldn't have anything to take. Just like Napoleon, Stalin did not allow any food to be given to them. He placed guards all around there area and wouldn't let anyone come in or go out. He did this because he didn't want anyone going out to tell the world what was going on and he didn't want any news reporters to come in and find out. He kept it hidden from the world. So the hens and the peasants are very similar to each other. They were both weak and hopeless. In the film, 9 hens died during the incident. In real-life, it is estimated that somewhere between 4 and 10 million Ukrainian peasants were starved to death by Stalin.