Abstract:

The famous novel Animal Farm is a political allegorical novel written by George Orwell. This novel is his masterpiece and published in England in 1945. TIME regards the book as one of the 100 best English-language novels. The various use of symbolism in Animal Farm makes the novel famous all over the world. This paper intends to analyze the symbolism in this novel. It is mainly divided into four parts. The first part is a brief introduction to the writer George Orwell and the background of Animal Farm. The second part is a summary of Animal Farm. The third part elaborates the meaning of symbolism and discusses the employment of symbolism in different characters and their symbolic significance. The fourth part is conclusion. Animal Farm still has its important meanings nowadays.

Keywords: Symbolism; Animal Farm; George Orwell; characters

摘要：

乔治•奥威尔的小说《动物农场》是一部著名的政治寓言小说，于1945年在英国出版。作为奥威尔的代表作，这部小说被《时代》杂志列为英国一百部最佳小说之一。丰富的象征手法的运用使《动物农场》这部小说闻名世界。本文旨在通过对《动物农场》的文本研究，分析小说中大量使用的象征意义。本文共分为三部分，第一部分对作者乔治•奥威尔和《动物农场》写作背景作简单介绍，分析小说写作的原因。第二部分是《动物农场》故事梗概，大致介绍小说内容及其主要人物。第三部分主要阐述了象征的含义，分析不同动物角色中象征的运用及其背后的深刻意义。第四部分为总结，《动物农场》在今天仍然有其重要意义。

关键词：象征；动物农场；乔治•奥威尔；角色

1   Introduction
George Orwell is a well-known novelist and journalist in the 20th century. He is known as a political writer too. Animal Farm is one of his famous novels and it is a satire of the Russian Revolution. Orwell, by his unique literally skills, fully enfolds to us a society clouded by lies. It is also the sarcasm to the selfishness, greed, and corruption of human nature. No matter whether you have read it or not, after you read this thesis, you will have an overall comprehension about this novel and a new understanding about the society in the 20th century.