The Cycles of History and the Collapse of Utopia:A Study of “Alternative Historical Hypotheses” in the Works of George Orwell and Mo Yingfeng

Introduction: Dystopia as the “Other” of Utopia

Utopia, at the level of narratology, presents an essential paradox: it is both ou-topos—“no place”—and eu-topos—“the good place.” According to the classic definition by Darko Suvin, utopia is not a mere escapist fantasy detached from reality, but a discursive construction grounded in an “alternative historical hypothesis.” Through the narrative device of estrangement, it reconstructs within a fictional spatiotemporal framework an ontological model of society—one in which institutional and ethical orders are organized upon principles more “perfect” than those of the real world.

Literary utopia thus becomes a laboratory of history. However, when George Orwell and Mo Yingfeng enter this domain, they do not set out to design blueprints of paradise. Rather, they assume the stance of dystopian historiographers, retrospectively tracing the catastrophic unfolding of these alternative histories.

In Animal Farm and A Utopian Dream (《桃源梦》), both writers rigorously map the full life cycle of utopia—from its emergence, through its deformation, to its eventual collapse. This narrative process is not merely a simulation of social experimentation; it functions as a profound historical warning. When a linear ideology of purity attempts to forcibly flatten the organic complexity of social life, the so-called “ideal state” is destined to descend into the abyss of cyclical history.

The Roots of Idealism: An Ideological Analysis of Animalism and Confucian “Benevolence”

The legitimacy of any utopian experiment originates in a radical negation of the existing order. Both George Orwell and Mo Yingfeng derive their foundational logic for social reconstruction from distinct intellectual traditions—Western revolutionary discourse and Eastern classical political philosophy, respectively.

Comparative Framework

Dimension	Animal Farm: Animalism	A Utopian Dream: Community of Benevolence
Ideological Core	Resistance to class exploitation; pursuit of absolute equality	Vision of Datong (Great Unity), the Peach Blossom Spring ideal, and Confucian benevolence
Underlying Logic	Total negation of “the human” (“Four legs good, two legs bad”)	Metaphysical faith in the inherent goodness of human nature (derived from San Zi Jing)
Social Vision	Elimination of class divisions; decentralized, self-governed farm	“The elderly, the weak, and the disabled are all cared for”; absolute harmony between humanity and nature
Narrative Failure Mechanism	Substitution of the oppressor	Denial of biological reality and private boundaries

Deep Deconstruction

In Mo Yingfeng’s work, the figure of Long Juzheng (Dragon) embodies a form of ideological leadership rooted in traditional Chinese enlightenment discourse. His social experiment transforms the moral axiom—“At the beginning, human nature is good”—into a totalizing discursive apparatus. By attempting to eradicate “self-interest,” he seeks to construct a universal order of harmony.

Yet this transformation is precisely where the danger lies. What begins as an ethical proposition becomes an instrument of systemic control. The assumption of innate goodness, once institutionalized, no longer tolerates deviation; it demands conformity.

Analytical Layer: “So What?”

The collapse of these “supreme good” ideals is not accidental. It arises from a fundamental flaw in their political narrative structure.

Both Animalism and the benevolent community attempt to replace the complexity of lived social relations with a simplified, linear model of moral purity. In doing so, they refuse to acknowledge essential dimensions of human existence:

• the will to power

• natural desires

• irreducible heterogeneity

  
  

By denying these elements, the system creates a latent vacuum of legitimacy—a structural blind spot that inevitably invites authoritarian intervention. What cannot be accommodated must eventually be controlled.

Thus, the tragedy of utopia lies not in its aspiration, but in its logic:when moral purity becomes absolute, it ceases to be ethical and becomes coercive.

The Bloody Threshold: Violence as the Midwife of Utopia

Within the framework of political narratology, a harsh truth emerges: any utopia that aspires to absolute peace must, at its moment of origin, pass through a bloody threshold. Violence is not only the destroyer of the old order, but also the midwife of the new ideal.

Parallel Structures and Sacrificial Violence

• Animal Farm

  The narrative logic closely mirrors the historical trajectory of the Russian Revolution. The egalitarian prophecy of Old Major can only be realized through a violent uprising against the human owner. Bloodshed becomes the necessary condition for the birth of a supposedly just society.

  
  

• A Utopian Dream (《桃源梦》)

  The emergence of “Heaven Beyond Heaven” is likewise steeped in fire and blood. In fleeing external persecution, the twenty-one founding members are forced into acts of violent self-defense during their migration. More symbolically, upon entering the isolated valley, internal conflicts erupt among families competing for the most fertile land. This state of near Hobbesian chaos is only “frozen” when the leader, Long Juzheng, loses an arm while preventing violence among his own people. His mutilation marks the suspension—rather than the resolution—of violence.

  
  

Analytical Argument

Long Juzheng’s severed arm functions as a metaphorical blood sacrifice, exposing a fundamental contradiction in the realization of utopia:the system must be brought into being through means that directly negate its own ideals—benevolence, harmony, and peace.

This rupture between ends and means is not incidental; it is structural. The founding violence does not disappear—it is merely displaced, internalized, and institutionalized. What is initially justified as necessary for survival or justice becomes the latent foundation upon which future coercion is built.

Thus, the “bloody threshold” is not only a beginning, but also a prophecy. It signals that a system born through contradiction will eventually preserve itself through deeper forms of control.

In seeking to eliminate violence, utopia first legitimizes it—and in doing so, ensures its own transformation into a system sustained by force.

The Logic of Corruption: From Charisma to Authoritarian Rule

As utopia enters its phase of stable operation, its mode of governance undergoes an inevitable structural transformation—from personal inspiration to bureaucratic control. This transition corresponds to what Max Weber famously termed the “routinization of charisma.”

The Institutionalization of Leadership

Second-generation leaders—Napoleon in Animal Farm and the First-born in A Utopian Dream (《桃源梦》)—no longer embody the quasi-sacred idealism of their predecessors, Old Major or Long Juzheng. Instead, they evolve into calculating administrators, skilled not in vision, but in the management and preservation of power.

Charisma, once the source of revolutionary legitimacy, is thus converted into institutional authority. What was once believed becomes what must be enforced.

The Alienation and Appropriation of Language

Language becomes the primary instrument of this transformation.

• In Animal Farm, the pigs systematically revise the Seven Commandments, gradually reshaping the meaning of equality itself. Through semantic manipulation, ideology is not overturned, but hollowed out from within.

• In A Utopian Dream, a more insidious process unfolds—what may be called the linguistic appropriation of the absurd. When confronted with the grotesque anomaly of a hempstalk breeding with cattle, the First-born designates the result as an “Ox-man.” This act is not mere naming; it is an act of conceptual absorption. By distorting the original meaning of “benevolence,” the system forcibly incorporates the unnatural into its moral framework, preserving the illusion of coherence and virtue.

  
  

The Ritual of Persuasion: The Apex of Discursive Violence

The invention of the “Ritual of Persuasion” in “Heaven Beyond Heaven” marks a decisive shift from physical punishment to psychological domination. Over ninety-nine consecutive days, eight officiants subject the individual to relentless cycles of verbal indoctrination, inducing a collapse of independent thought.

This is a form of discursive violence more severe than physical restraint. Moral instruction is transformed into an omnipotent apparatus of control, where language no longer communicates truth but enforces submission.

Analytical Layer: “So What?”

The figure of Guaqing (Cucumber), a non-believer who rejects vegetarianism and refuses to acknowledge Long Juzheng’s authority, becomes the ultimate test case for this system.

His fate reveals a decisive truth:when the system fails to assimilate dissent through “moral persuasion,” it abandons the facade of benevolence and mobilizes the full weight of collective morality to enact spiritual annihilation.

Guaqing’s suicide is not merely an individual tragedy—it is the logical endpoint of a system that cannot tolerate heterogeneity. What begins as a project of ethical unity culminates in the elimination of difference.

Thus, the routinization of charisma does not stabilize utopia—it transforms it.From a community bound by belief, it becomes a regime sustained by control, where language itself is weaponized, and morality becomes the final instrument of power.

Nature’s Revenge: Gender, Desire, and the Imprisoned Individual

Utopian narratives often seek to suppress the natural attributes of the individual through uniform collective discipline. Yet such suppression inevitably provokes a violent return of what has been repressed—an uprising rooted not in ideology, but in biological instinct.

Case Study: The Illusion of Undifferentiated Benevolence

The ironic episode of Gardenia, the “benevolent woman” who nurses a calf at the cost of her own child’s death, reveals a profound contradiction. When an ideal attempts to transcend the boundaries of biological instinct, the result is not an elevation of altruism, but the collapse of natural ethics.

Here, benevolence ceases to be humane; it becomes abstract, detached from life itself. In denying the primacy of natural bonds, the system undermines the very foundation of care it claims to uphold.

Desire as an Epistemological Rebellion

Under the doctrine of “preserve heavenly principle, eliminate human desire,” Zhaoti is coerced into a pathological marriage with Goujian, a physically disabled man.

Gardenia’s admonition—“treat yourself as a piece of wood”—exposes a deeper logic: the objectification of the self, particularly of women, within a rigid moral order.

Desire, in this context, is not merely physical—it becomes a form of knowledge. To feel is to know; to desire is to resist.

The Nature of Rebellion

Zhaoti’s illicit relationship with Athong transcends the realm of sensory transgression. It constitutes an epistemological act of defiance—a reclaiming of the self against an imposed moral abstraction.

As noted in Hu Zongjian’s philosophical reading of A Utopian Dream:

“Sex is the ultimate expression of individuality… sexual experience forms the foundation of health and happiness; it is a crucial manifestation of the self in its search for the mysteries of life.”

This perspective reframes desire not as moral failure, but as existential affirmation.

Analytical Insight

The awakening of the individual body reveals a critical limit of utopian control:the human body cannot be fully appropriated by ideology.

Desire becomes the last fortress of individuality—irreducible, embodied, and resistant. It refuses to be subsumed under state will or collective discourse.

Thus, nature’s revenge is not chaotic—it is revelatory.What utopia seeks to suppress returns as truth:that any system denying the body ultimately denies the human.

Conclusion: The “Unfinished Hypothesis” in a Cyclical View of History

At the conclusion of Animal Farm, the faces of pigs and humans become indistinguishable. The restoration of the farm’s original name signals the closure of a historical loop: a project driven by the pursuit of progress ultimately returns to its point of origin, governed once again by the inertial logic of power.

In contrast, Mo Yingfeng reveals, through the destruction of “Heaven Beyond Heaven” in the mad-cattle catastrophe, what may be called the “aporia of the utopian mind.” This alternative historical hypothesis, grounded in Confucian ideals, is destined to collapse in practice because of its hostility toward the complexity of human nature. Yet the closing image—Sanhan’s dream amid the ruins, of a salt mountain from which fresh meat grows without slaughter—captures the stubbornness and absurdity of human idealism. Only within a vision that completely violates physical laws and biological logic can utopia appear attainable.

As alternative historical hypotheses, these two works derive their enduring value from exposing the vast gap between ideal and reality. Literature does not offer perfected blueprints; rather, through the experimental lens of estrangement, it serves as a warning. Any social design that refuses to acknowledge individual difference and natural desire will ultimately collapse—only to re-emerge, once again, within the cyclical ruins of history, awaiting its next fall.