Thursday, October 24, 2002
When synapses misfire
I'm sure Andy Sullivan was trying to make a point here:
ANIMAL FARM: I just re-read the Orwell classic on the plane to and from Ohio. I'm prepping for the NYU panel tonight. Two re-inforced impressions, which have certainly occurred to many others before. One key shift toward totalitarianism in the novel comes when the old hymn "Beasts of England" gets replaced by Napoleon (the chief pig and Stalin figure) to a more generic song praising "Animal Farm." Orwell's point, I think, is that patriotism is, for all its faults, far more humane and progressive than its opposite. Today's left would do well to remember that, I think.
I'm just not sure what it is. Maybe he can define for us what the opposite of patriotism is, and why it is more "humane and progressive". You know us "leftists"... we're always trying to do well.
|