Animal Farm Is a World of Man

Abstract

In the beginning of the 20th century, feminist literary theory was concerned mainly
 with the social and political role of women, as well as women’s role in literature. In
 the second half of the century, it is tried to study women’s social positions and their
 rights compared to the male counterpart. One of the most explored themes since
 then was gender and patriarchy. The aim of this paper is to show how women were
 depicted in literature after half a century of the struggle of the first wave feminist
 towards equality and stress the importance of theorizing the concept of patriarchy, as a
 first step to understanding women’s subjugation. This unfolds through a re-visitation of
 George Orwell’s fiction novels. Orwell is better known by his political writing. Although
 he has never used the word “Feminism”, in any of his fictional works, two decades
 after his death, the radical feminist, Daphne Patai accused him that he is anti-feminist,
 fundamentally because of his deprecatory stands towards women through his female
 characters. The selected texts reinforce patriarchal ideology, through the way Orwell
 portrayed his male and female characters. A feminist analytical approach will be
 adopted in the realization of this research, in order to analyse the novel in depth, with
 a focus on Orwell’s portrayal of female characters. Observing and commenting how he
 debases, mistreats and degrades them. Further, it sheds the light on how he portrays
 his male characters by analysing female and male protagonists. The significant of the
 study is to show the social and political context of the time regarding the role and the
 identity of women in the British society in the 20th century, and how women were
 treated under patriarch society and still until our days. Moreover, it sheds light on how
 patriarchy the concept of women oppression helped in the development of feminist
 theories.