Brenda Yeung 3
October 13, 2014
Compare and Contrast: Animal Farm v. The Lowest Animal
Although humans rule the world with advanced degrees and big businesses, Animal Farm and The Lowest Animal expose how animals are superior to humans. Respectively, authors George Orwell and Mark Twain uses satire to encourage their readers to think outside of the box. Orwell's Animal Farm relates to about the Russian Soviet Union. It’s about communism, and how the animals of Animal Farm overpower the humans, but in the end the pigs also become corrupt and emulate humans. Twain's The Lowest Animal talks about humans being the lowest animal. Both books are satirical because Animal Farm uses it to relate to the Soviet Union, while The Lowest Animal uses it to get to his point. These books have many similarities and differences throughout their story.
Twain and Orwell similarly express the superiority of animals over humans. “Of all the animals, man is the only one that is cruel.” Twain expresses this to make his point, that man is the lowest animal. “Four legs good, two legs bad”(34). This phrase points out the creatures of Animal Farm that have two legs, humans, were the enemy or considered bad. Both these quotes expose animals being superior over humans. These authors also encouraged readers to think. Orwell required his readers to think outside of the box while Twain was relating to the Soviet Union, without referencing the Soviet Union. Animal is used in both title books; this leads the reader to thinking the story is related to animals, but instead it’s a reflection of human behavior. In these stories the animals are very independent. “The higher animals are the only ones who exclusively do their own work and provide their own living.” The Lowest Animal is stating that the higher animal, animals do their own work for themselves; humans don’t. “…their own food, produced by themselves and for themselves”(28). Animal Farm says this after the animals rebel and no longer have their human master controlling them. These quotes illustrate how the animals are independent in both books. The last similarity is how the people betray each other. “broods over them, waits till a chance offers, then takes revenge.” Twain states this to prove to his readers that man will turn against each other if you fault them in a way. “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” In Animal Farm, Orwell writes this to show the irony that the pigs are turning against their own farm. Superiority, requiring readers to think, independency, and betrayal on another are the various similarities in both these works of satire literature.
Both authors arrived at their goal of showing the lowness of man with different approaches. In The Lowest Animal, Twain presents man as the lowest animal by giving “scientific facts”; in Animal Farm, Orwell demonstrates it by having the animals abolish the humans. “Man was made at the end of the week's work, when God was tired.” Twain states this to tell his readers,