The IRD is most notable for being the government department to which George Orwell submitted his list of suspected communists (Orwell's list), including many notable people such as Charlie Chaplin, Paul Robeson, and Michael Redgrave. With the help of Orwell's widow Sonia Orwell and his former publisher Fredric Warburg, the IRD gained the foreign rights to much of Orwell's work and spent years distributing "Animal Farm" onto every continent, translating Orwell's works into 20 different languages, funding the creation of an "Animal Farm" cartoon, and working with the CIA to create the feature-length "Animal Farm" animated movie, the first of its kind in British history. Many historians have noted how Orwell's literary reputation can largely be credited to joint propaganda operations between the IRD and CIA. The IRD heavily marketed "Animal Farm" for audiences in the middle-east in an attempt to sway Arab nationalism and independence activists from seeking Soviet aid, as it was believed by IRD agents that a story featuring pigs as the villains would appeal highly towards Muslim audiences. The IRD funded the activities of many authors including Arthur Koestler, Bertrand Russell, and Robert Conquest.