What Happened To Snowball In Animal Farm

Snowball gets scapegoated hard. One minute he’s debating plans for the farm, next he’s sprinting for his life from Napoleon’s attack dogs. Orwell doesn’t even give him a dramatic death—just exile and a smear campaign. The pigs erase his contributions, then blame him for everything from broken fences to bad weather. It’s wild how quickly the animals buy into it, especially Boxer with his blind faith. The real tragedy? Snowball’s ideas were legit good, but fear and propaganda crushed them. Classic power play—create an enemy, rewrite history, profit.

Snowball's fate in 'Animal Farm' is one of the most brutal examples of political purges in literature. I remember reading it and feeling like I'd been punched in the gut. At first, he's this brilliant, passionate leader—the kind who actually believes in the revolution. His plans for the windmill? Pure genius. But that’s exactly why Napoleon sees him as a threat. The way Orwell writes it, you can almost smell the fear in the air during that meeting where the dogs chase Snowball off. It’s not just exile; it’s a complete rewriting of history afterward. The pigs turn him into this demonic figure, blaming every failure on him. The most chilling part? The sheep mindlessly chanting "Four legs good, two legs bad" to drown out any dissent. It’s a masterclass in how dictators manufacture enemies to control the narrative.

What really gets me is the parallel to real-life revolutions. Snowball is the Trotsky to Napoleon’s Stalin, complete with the icy pragmatism of power. The windmill becomes this symbol of hope twisted into propaganda—first it’s Snowball’s 'treasonous' idea, then Napoleon claims it as his own. The animals’ confusion mirrors how authoritarian regimes gaslight entire populations. Boxer’s insistence that "Napoleon is always right" is heartbreaking because it shows how loyalty gets weaponized. And let’s not forget the final knife twist: the pigs later secretly admit Snowball was never a traitor, but by then, no one cares. The system’s already won.