Last night I read a story called Yugao, from my Anthology of Japanese Literature. Yugao was a chapter of the great Japanese masterpiece called Genji Monogatari, which is usually (always?) translated into English as The Tale of Genji. It is considered to be Japan’s greatest work of literature, and it was written all the way back in the 11th century. Think about that, people. That’s 1000 years ago. 1000 years ago, and it slaps. And I was thinking, are there any books that we still read in Western literature that are that old? I thought of The Canterbury Tales and Shakespeare stuff, but I don’t actually know when they were written. I’m going to guess 15th century. Shall we Google it? (Shakespeare, 16th century, The Canterbury Tales end of 14th century.) Don Quixote, another old Western classic, 16th century. We have Beowulf, and Beowulf is older, between 600-1000 CE. From what I just read last night in The Tale of Genji, Beowulf is really primitive in comparison. Beowulf also slaps though.
All I really wanted to say here is that Yugao was riveting and compelling, and that maybe we should be including The Tale of Genji on our lists of greatest works of literature, and I want to read the whole book.
I dismantled more Chinese Privet this morning. I needed something to get me activated, give me some enthusiasm. Seek, and ye shall find. Every time I look, I find more of it in my yard. I now have an enormous pile of trunks and branches in the driveway.
Last night I read that snippet of The Tale of Genji, but a few nights ago I read Animal Farm. You know, in high school I believe I really did say, in my English class, when we were discussing the book, or at least I definitely thought this, because it has now been ringing in my ears, I remember thinking, “Maybe this book doesn’t have a political message. Maybe there is no symbolism. Maybe he just wanted to write about animals.” Well, high school me was not very smart. At least, I didn’t know much about the world and the machinations and movements of societies. I also remember that I thought Old Man and The Sea was boring, and could not understand how this was a celebrated work of literature. I’ve also recently read that, and of course just like with Animal Farm, feel very differently about it now, but that’s how it goes. We are not always ready for what the books have to tell us, and especially I’m sure when the books are about life, and living, and you’re young and still don’t know much about that. But I read Animal Farm, after attempting again like every single night for the last month, it feels like, to try and go to sleep before midnight, and after attempting this and again laying in bed with my mind whirring, fully awake, for an hour, I opened it up, and I read it all the way through. I have gotten into the habit of testing out books, because I have picked up so many classics from an amazing used goods store here in Nashville called MacKays’s, and when I’m looking for something to read I will just grab one that I have laying around and start reading, and if it grabs me I’ll keep reading, and if not I’ll put it down and plan to come back to it when I’m ready for it. So I just picked up Animal Farm to take a little looksie, and then I didn’t put it back down until I was done. This little book that I had thougth really nothing of in high school, hit me harder this time around.
The thing about Animal Farm is that, after I was done with it, I felt very disturbed. I was disturbed, I can say, because unfortunately, it was way, way too easy to draw parallels between what happened on that farm (I mean some countries right now are fully fledged Napoleon farms, North Korea, China, Russia), and what’s happening in many countries around the world, but most unfortunately, with what’s happening here in America. In such plain and simple language, Orwell shows exactly how a population is tricked or cowed into loyalty to a ruler, the steps by which that ruler is able to establish complete control, and how it ultimately descends into conditions that are just as bad if not worse than any the animals on the farm had experienced before their revolution, in hopes of achieving a more equal and fair society. All of the mechanisms, subtle and not so subtle, the gradual degrees in which the population is subjugated, duped, placated, or cowed, until they are completely subservient to the regime, and the single ruler above all.
In the days since reading it, there’s been one character who’s stayed with me, who I’ve been thinking about, and that’s Benjamin, the donkey. Benjamin is the character that really got to me, because Benjamin is exactly who I don’t want to be. Most of the animals on the farm can’t quite grasp what’s happening, the meaning of the events that are taking place, the inevitable outcomes of decisions that are being made. They may not understand at all, or they may have some reservations about changes that they can’t quite express, but their concerns are either relieved by Squealer’s sweet, compelling, and manipulative words, or they are forced into silence by Napoleon’s dogs, or they are steamrolled by the sheep, and never given the chance for public discourse. Some of the animals eventually draw lines in the sand, when pushed too far, but at that point Napoleon (the pig, ruler) has solidified his power, and has the military/police force at his command (in the form of dogs that he bred for the role), and so he can deal with them via force. A few of the other pigs are aware, and dissent, and as they are threats, are killed. Benjamin doesn’t object, doesn’t dissent, but Benjamin is aware. He knows what’s up. Benjamin is old, Benjamin is smart, Benjamin has been around for a long time, and Benjamin is cynical. His expectations are low, and he is not passionate. So, Benjamin is something like an outsider, politically, or inert. He’s not involved, does not lean one way or the other, does not offer any opinions, does not rock the boat. Benjamin is not ignorant, however – he is intelligent, he sees, he understands. He simply chooses passivity. Benjamin cares about one thing, he has no allegance to anything other than his friend, the workhorse, Boxer, and so the only time we see Benjamin show any real emotion or move to action is when Boxer is being taken to his death. Benjamin is so exasperated by the other animals’ stupidity, that they can’t understand that Boxer is not really being taken to the vet, but instead has been sold to the “knacker” to become glue, and so upset that he’s losing Boxer, that he actually does something, and shouts at the all, hey, you dumbasses, that cart says “horse killer” on it, he’s not going to the vet!!!!!! And of course they all try to save Boxer then and fail, and Benjamin goes back to being a passive bystander, now without his best friend, Boxer.
This is why Benjamin has stuck with me. Benjamin is passive, and it costs him his best friend. It probably costs him his happiness too. He’s cynical, and sad. And even though he tries to keep out of affairs and makes no waves, he cannot get out unscathed. The hens die, some of them, because they refuse to lay more eggs for the regime. Their defiance costs them their lives. The pigs die, some of them, because they voice their dissent at the meetings. Benjamin doesn’t die, because he doesn’t dissent – but he still suffers, and he suffers doubly because he loses Boxer, and because he has to live with a cynical, hopeless worldview to justify living his life of inaction.
That begs the question – would you rather resist, risking death for the cause, or would you rather comply, and live (possibly, because Boxer complied, and still he died for it), and suffer? I don’t think that Benjamin ever felt compelled to resist, though, because Benjamin didn’t care one way or the other. I think Benjamin did not really have a belief that things could be any better, as he says, which actually can be perfectly summed up by the words of a cynical friend of mine, “Life sucks, then you die.” Benjamin had no reason to act, because he didn’t think it would matter, whether Napoleon was the ruler, whether a human was the ruler, or whether Snowball, who could have potentially have been a much better ruler for their new society, was the ruler. In Benjamin’s eyes none of it mattered, because life would still suck, life would still be hard, that that was just how life was.
There were other politically inactive, politically indifferent characters, but they weren’t as aware as Benjamin. Benjamin was indifferent, inactive due to his cynicism. Moses, the raven, also didn’t care who ruled the farm, but that was because he had Sugarcandy Mountain. He was a problem for the pigs in the beginning, because while they were trying to fill the other animals’ heads with ideas about their political systems and designs for the society (which they called, Animalism), Moses was out here telling everyone about Sugarcandy Mountain, and how great Sugarcandy Mountain was, this magical place that you went when you died, and got all the sugar you ever wanted. Moses had religion. He was not interested in the movements of the animals or their society. He was outside of it. (Or, possibly, Moses himself didn’t believe in Sugarcandy Mountain, but both governments, Mr. Jones’s and Napoleon’s found his preaching useful, and so they would treat him well.) Moses was useful to Napoleon later though, I think, when things had gotten so bad that he couldn’t give them much else to work for in terms of hope, so if they couldn’t believe in a good life on the farm anymore, they could at least believe in Sugarcandy Mountain. There was the cat, who just didn’t care about anything at all, (classic cat stereotype) and there was Mollie, the white mare, who just wanted to eat sugar and have ribbons in her hair. She wanted an easy life. She didn’t care about politics, but she liked the way she was treated by Mr. Jones, because she got sugar and ribbons, so for her the previous order was just fine, and in the new one she couldn’t have her sugar and ribbons, so she went to another farm where she could.
I don’t want to be a Benjamin.
HAKUMUSU 