Old Major from Animal Farm by George Orwell

Old Major

Old Major -  The prize-winning boar whose vision of a socialist utopia serves as the inspiration for the Rebellion. Three days after describing the vision and teaching the animals the song “Beasts of England,” Major dies, leaving Snowball and Napoleon to struggle for control of his legacy. Orwell based Major on both the German political economist Karl Marx and the Russian revolutionary leader Vladimir Ilych Lenin.

As a democratic socialist, Orwell had a great deal of respect for Karl Marx, the German political economist, and even for Vladimir Ilych Lenin, the Russian revolutionary leader. His critique of Animal Farm has little to do with the Marxist ideology underlying the Rebellion but rather with the perversion of that ideology by later leaders. Major, who represents both Marx and Lenin, serves as the source of the ideals that the animals continue to uphold even after their pig leaders have betrayed them.

Though his portrayal of Old Major is largely positive, Orwell does include a few small ironies that allow the reader to question the venerable pig’s motives. For instance, in the midst of his long litany of complaints about how the animals have been treated by human beings, Old Major is forced to concede that his own life has been long, full, and free from the terrors he has vividly sketched for his rapt audience. He seems to have claimed a false brotherhood with the other animals in order to garner their support for his vision.

Last night I had a strange dream. Many years ago when I was a little pig, my mother and the other sows used to sing a secret and ancient song. I learnt that song. I learnt its words, I learnt its music. But it has long since passed out of my mind. Last night it came back to me. In my dream …..

Beasts of England! Beasts of Ireland!
Beasts of land and sea and skies!
Hear the hoofbeats of tomorrow!
See the golden future rise!
The animals stire, but he quietens them.

 Wait‑no noise‑wait! Or we’ll wake up Jones I am over twelve years old and I have had over four hundred children. I think I understand the nature of life on this earth as well as any animal now living. Listen carefully, for I do not think that I shall be with you for many months longer.

 Listen!

How does the life of an animal pass?
In endless drudgery.
What’s the fist lesson an animal learns?
To endure its slavery.
How does the life of an animal end?
In cruel butchery.

 Is this simply part of the order of nature? No, comrades. This farm would support a dozen horses, twenty cows, hundreds of sheep— all of them living in comfort and dignity beyond our imagining. Our labour tills the soil, our dung fertilizes it. And yet there is not one of us who owns more than his bare skin. The produce of our labour is stolen from us by human beings. Man is our only enemy. What must we do? Why, work, comrades. Work night and day, body and soul, for the overthrow of the human race! Rebellion~ That is my message to you, comrades! Rebellion.

The Seagull by Anton Chekhov

NINA:

Why do you say you kiss the ground I walk on? You should have killed me instead (Leans on the table). I'm so tired! I want to rest, I just want to rest! (Raises her head) I’m the seagull... No, that's not it. I'm an actress. That’s it.(From the other room we hear Arkadina and Trigorin laughing. Nina listens for a minute, goes to the left door, and looks through the keyhole) He’s here, too. (Crosses to Konstantin) He is, isn’t he? Well, never mind. He never believed in the theatre, he laughed at all my dreams, and little by little I stopped believing in it too. And then all the emotional stress, the jealousy; I was always afraid for the baby… I started getting petty, depressed, my acting was emptier and emptier… strains of love, jealousy, constant fear for the child...I didn't know what to do with my hands, I didn’t know how to hold myself onstage, I couldn’t control my voice. You don’t know what that’s like, to realize you’re a terrible actor. I’m the seagull… No, that’s not it… Remember that seagull you shot? A man comes along, sees her, and destroys her life because he has nothing better to do… subject for a short story. No, that’s not it… (Rubs her forehead) What was I saying? Oh, yes, the theatre… I’m not like that anymore. I’m a real actress now, I enjoy acting, I’m proud of it, the stage intoxicates me. When I’m up there I feel beautiful. And these days, being back here, walking for hours on end, thinking and thinking, I could feel my soul growing stronger day after day. And now I know, Kostya, I understand, finally, that in our business—acting, writing, it makes no difference—the main thing isn’t being famous, it’s not the sound of applause, it’s not what I dreamed it was. All it is is the strength to keep going, no matter what happens. You have to keep on believing. I believe, and it helps. And now when I think about my vocation, I’m not afraid of life. Shh… I’d better go. Goodbye. When I become a great actress, come watch me act, won’t you? Promise. It’s late. (Takes his hand) I can barely stand. I’m so tired, I’m so hungry… No, don’t come with me, I can go by myself; it’s not far to where the carriage is….So she brought him with her, didn’t she? Oh, well, what difference does it make? When You see Trigorin, don’t say anything about this… I love him. I love him even more than before. Subject for a short story. I love him, I love him, I love him to despair. Things were so lovely back then, Kostya, weren’t they? Remember? We thought life was bright, shining, joyful, and our feelings were like delicate flowers. Remember?

The Two Gentlemen of Verona (Act IV, Scene iv)

JULIA: 

A virtuous gentlewoman, mild and beautiful. 

I hope my master's suit will be but cold,

Since she respects my mistress' love so much. 

Alas, how love can trifle with itself!

Here is her picture: let me see; I think,

If I had such a tire, this face of mine

Were full as lovely as is this of hers;

And yet the painter flatter'd her a little,

Unless I flatter with myself too much. 

Her hair is auburn, mine is perfect yellow: 

If that be all the difference in his love

I'll get me such a colour'd periwig. 

Her eyes are grey as glass, and so are mine: 

Ay, but her forehead's low, and mine's as high. 

What should it be that he respects in her

But I can make respective in myself,

If this fond Love were not a blinded god?

Come, shadow, come, and take this shadow up,

For 'tis thy rival. O thou senseless form! 

Thou shalt be worshipped, kiss'd, loved, and adored. 

And, were there sense in his idolatry,

My substance should be statue in they stead.

I'll use thee kindly for thy mistress' sake. 

That us'd me so; or else, by Jove I vow,

I should have scratch'd out your unseeing eyes,

To make my master out of love with thee. (Exit) 

(Summary) 

The encounter between Silvia and Julia is significant in that it marks the first time that two characters express and share concern about others: both are simultaneously outraged at the philandering Proteus and worried about the abandoned Julia. In discussing such important concepts as friendship and romantic love, the two women are able to relate to each other, despite the fact that Julia views Silvia as her rival. Silvia and Julia trade objects (Julia's ring and Silvia's picture) and stories just as Valentine and Proteus will ultimately trade women. The interaction between these two women is far more meaningful than the slapdash rush of the play's ending, in which the play's intended couples are hastily paired up again, allows. A feminist reading of the play would interpret the bond of female friendship (despite Julia's disguise) as the most important, enduring, and under-developed aspect of the play. Silvia and Julia are both resourceful women who take risks in order to be reunited with the men they love. Neither betrays her man (Julia sublimates herself in order to be true to her love, forcing herself to withstand the discomfort of helping the man she loves woo another woman), and each remains true to the other woman as well: Silvia in her sympathy for Julia, and Julia, as Sebastian, in her unwillingness to drag Silvia into Proteus' web of treachery and betrayal.

Antigone by Sophocles (497 BC - 406 BC)

Antigone is the tragedy of a woman who is sentenced to death by her Uncle Creon for disobeying his edict that she must not give proper burial to her brother because Creon has condemned him as a traitor. This scene begins with Creon confronting Antigone about her disobeying him.  And continues with her thoughts before she is led away to her death. 

That order did not come from God. Justice,

That dwells with the gods below, knows no such law.

I did not think your edicts strong enough

To overrule the unwritten unalterable laws

Of God and heaven, you being only a man.

They are not of yesterday or today, but everlasting,

Though where they came from, none of us can tell.  

Guilty of their transgression before God

I cannot be, for any man on earth.

I knew that I should have to die, of course,

With or without your order. If it be soon,

So much the better.  Living in daily torment

As I do, who would not be glad to die?

This punishment will not be any pain.

Only if I had let my mother’s son

Lie there unburied, then I could not have borne it.

This I can bear.

There is nothing that you can say

That I should wish to hear, as nothing I say

Can weigh with you. I have given my brother burial.

What greater honour could I wish? All these

Would say that what I did was honourable,

But fear locks up their lips.  To speak and act

Just as he likes is a king’s prerogative.

So to my grave,

My bridal-bower, my everlasting prison,

I go, to join those many of my kinsmen

Who dwell in the mansions of Persephone,

Last and unhappiest, before my time.

Yet I believe my father will be there

To welcome me, my mother greet me gladly,

And you, my brother, gladly see me come.

Each one of you my hands have laid to rest,

Pouring the due libations on your graves.

It was by this service to your dear body, Polynices,

I earned the punishment which now I suffer,

Though all good people know it was for your honour.

O but I would not have done the forbidden thing

For any husband or for any son.

For why? I could have had another husband

And by him other sons, if one were lost;

but, father and mother lost, where would I get

Another brother? For thus preferring you,

My brother, Creon condemns me and hales me away,

Never a bride, never a mother, unfriended,

Condemned alive to solitary death.