animal farm benjamin essay

Animal Farm

George orwell, ask litcharts ai: the answer to your questions.

Welcome to the LitCharts study guide on George Orwell's Animal Farm . Created by the original team behind SparkNotes, LitCharts are the world's best literature guides.

Animal Farm: Introduction

Animal farm: plot summary, animal farm: detailed summary & analysis, animal farm: themes, animal farm: quotes, animal farm: characters, animal farm: symbols, animal farm: theme wheel, brief biography of george orwell.

Historical Context of Animal Farm

Other books related to animal farm.

• Full Title: Animal Farm
• When Written: 1944-45
• Where Written: England
• When Published: 1945
• Literary Period: Modernism
• Genre: Allegorical Novel
• Setting: A farm somewhere in England in the first half of the 20th century
• Climax: The pigs appear standing upright and the sheep bleat, “Four legs good, two legs better!”
• Antagonist: Napoleon specifically, but the pigs and the dogs as groups are all antagonists.
• Point of View: Third Person

Extra Credit for Animal Farm

Tough Crowd. Though Animal Farm eventually made Orwell famous, three publishers in England and several American publishing houses rejected the novel at first. One of the English editors to reject the novel was the famous poet T.S. Eliot, who was an editor at the Faber & Faber publishing house. One American editor, meanwhile, told Orwell that it was “impossible to sell animal stories in the U.S.A.”

Red Scare. Orwell didn’t just write literature that condemned the Communist state of the USSR. He did everything he could, from writing editorials to compiling lists of men he knew were Soviet spies, to combat the willful blindness of many intellectuals in the West to USSR atrocities.

A Summary and Analysis of George Orwell’s Animal Farm

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

Animal Farm is, after Nineteen Eighty-Four , George Orwell’s most famous book. Published in 1945, the novella (at under 100 pages, it’s too short to be called a full-blown ‘novel’) tells the story of how a group of animals on a farm overthrow the farmer who puts them to work, and set up an equal society where all animals work and share the fruits of their labours.

However, as time goes on, it becomes clear that the society the animals have constructed is not equal at all. It’s well-known that the novella is an allegory for Communist Russia under Josef Stalin, who was leader of the Soviet Union when Orwell wrote the book. Before we dig deeper into the context and meaning of Animal Farm with some words of analysis, it might be worth refreshing our memories with a brief summary of the novella’s plot.

Animal Farm: plot summary

The novella opens with an old pig, named Major, addressing his fellow animals on Manor Farm. Major criticises Mr Jones, the farmer who owns Manor Farm, because he controls the animals, takes their produce (the hens’ eggs, the cows’ milk), but gives them little in return. Major tells the other animals that man, who walks on two feet unlike the animals who walk on four, is their enemy.

They sing a rousing song in favour of animals, ‘Beasts of England’. Old Major dies a few days later, but the other animals have been inspired by his message.

Two pigs in particular, Snowball and Napoleon, rouse the other animals to take action against Mr Jones and seize the farm for themselves. They draw up seven commandments which all animals should abide by: among other things, these commandments forbid an animal to kill another animal, and include the mantra ‘four legs good, two legs bad’, because animals (who walk on four legs) are their friends while their two-legged human overlords are evil. (We have analysed this famous slogan here .)

The animals lead a rebellion against Mr Jones, whom they drive from the farm. They rename Manor Farm ‘Animal Farm’, and set about running things themselves, along the lines laid out in their seven commandments, where every animal is equal. But before long, it becomes clear that the pigs – especially Napoleon and Snowball – consider themselves special, requiring special treatment, as the leaders of the animals.

Nevertheless, when Mr Jones and some of the other farmers lead a raid to try to reclaim the farm, the animals work together to defend the farm and see off the men. A young farmhand is knocked unconscious, and initially feared dead.

Things begin to fall apart: Napoleon’s windmill, which he has instructed the animals to build, is vandalised and he accuses Snowball of sabotaging it. Snowball is banished from the farm. During winter, many of the animals are on the brink of starvation.

Napoleon engineers it so that when Mr Whymper, a man from a neighbouring farm with whom the pigs have started to trade (so the animals can acquire the materials they need to build the windmill), visits the farm, he overhears the animals giving a positive account of life on Animal Farm.

Without consulting the hens first, Napoleon organises a deal with Mr Whymper which involves giving him many of the hens’ eggs. They rebel against him, but he starves them into submission, although not before nine hens have died. Napoleon then announces that Snowball has been visiting the farm at night and destroying things.

Napoleon also claims that Snowball has been in league with Mr Jones all the time, and that even at the Battle of the Cowshed (as the animals are now referring to the farmers’ unsuccessful raid on the farm) Snowball was trying to sabotage the fight so that Jones won.

The animals are sceptical about this, because they all saw Snowball bravely fighting alongside them. Napoleon declares he has discovered ‘secret documents’ which prove Snowball was in league with their enemy.

Life on Animal Farm becomes harder for the animals, and Boxer, while labouring hard to complete the windmill, falls and injures his lung. The pigs arrange for him to be taken away and treated, but when the van arrives and takes him away, they realise too late that the van belongs to a man who slaughters horses, and that Napoleon has arranged for Boxer to be taken away to the knacker’s yard and killed.

Squealer lies to the animals, though, and when he announces Boxer’s death two days later, he pretends that the van had been bought by a veterinary surgeon who hadn’t yet painted over the old sign on the side of the van. The pigs take to wearing green ribbons and order in another crate of whisky for them to drink; they don’t share this with the other animals.

A few years pass, and some of the animals die, Napoleon and Squealer get fatter, and none of the animals is allowed to retire, as previously promised. The farm gets bigger and richer, but the luxuries the animals had been promised never materialised: they are told that the real pleasure is derived from hard work and frugal living.

Then, one day, the animals see Squealer up on his hind legs, walking on two legs like a human instead of on four like an animal.

The other pigs follow; and Clover and Benjamin discover that the seven commandments written on the barn wall have been rubbed off, to be replace by one single commandment: ‘All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.’ The pigs start installing radio and a telephone in the farmhouse, and subscribe to newspapers.

Finally, the pigs invite humans into the farm to drink with them, and announce a new partnership between the pigs and humans. Napoleon announces to his human guests that the name of the farm is reverting from Animal Farm to the original name, Manor Farm.

The other animals from the farm, observing this through the window, can no longer tell which are the pigs and which are the men, because Napoleon and the other pigs are behaving so much like men now.

Things have gone full circle: the pigs are no different from Mr Jones (indeed, are worse).

Animal Farm: analysis

First, a very brief history lesson, by way of context for Animal Farm . In 1917, the Tsar of Russia, Nicholas II, was overthrown by Communist revolutionaries.

These revolutionaries replaced the aristocratic rule which had been a feature of Russian society for centuries with a new political system: Communism, whereby everyone was equal. Everyone works, but everyone benefits equally from the results of that work. Josef Stalin became leader of Communist Russia, or the Soviet Union, in the early 1920s.

However, it soon became apparent that Stalin’s Communist regime wasn’t working: huge swathes of the population were working hard, but didn’t have enough food to survive. They were starving to death.

But Stalin and his politicians, who themselves were well-off, did nothing to combat this problem, and indeed actively contributed to it. But they told the people that things were much better since the Russian Revolution and the overthrow of the Tsar, than things had been before, under Nicholas II. The parallels with Orwell’s Animal Farm are crystal-clear.

Animal Farm is an allegory for the Russian Revolution and the formation of a Communist regime in Russia (as the Soviet Union). We offer a fuller definition of allegory in a separate post, but the key thing is that, although it was subtitled A Fairy Story , Orwell’s novella is far from being a straightforward tale for children. It’s also political allegory, and even satire.

The cleverness of Orwell’s approach is that he manages to infuse his story with this political meaning while also telling an engaging tale about greed, corruption, and ‘society’ in a more general sense.

One of the commonest techniques used in both Stalinist Russia and in Animal Farm is what’s known as ‘gaslighting’ (meaning to manipulate someone by psychological means so they begin to doubt their own sanity; the term is derived from the film adaptation of Gaslight , a play by Patrick Hamilton).

For instance, when Napoleon and the other pigs take to eating their meals and sleeping in the beds in the house at Animal Farm, Clover is convinced this goes against one of the seven commandments the animals drew up at the beginning of their revolution.

But one of the pigs has altered the commandment (‘No animal shall sleep in a bed’), adding the words ‘ with sheets ’ to the end of it. Napoleon and the other pigs have rewritten history, but they then convince Clover that she is the one who is mistaken, and that she’s misremembered what the wording of the commandment was.

Another example of this technique – which is a prominent feature of many totalitarian regimes, namely keep the masses ignorant as they’re easier to manipulate that way – is when Napoleon claims that Snowball has been in league with Mr Jones all along. When the animals question this, based on all of the evidence to the contrary, Napoleon and Squealer declare they have ‘secret documents’ which prove it.

But the other animals can’t read them, so they have to take his word for it. Squealer’s lie about the van that comes to take Boxer away (he claims it’s going to the vet, but it’s clear that Boxer is really being taken away to be slaughtered) is another such example.

Communist propaganda

Much as Stalin did in Communist Russia, Napoleon actively rewrites history , and manages to convince the animals that certain things never happened or that they are mistaken about something. This is a feature that has become more and more prominent in political society, even in non-totalitarian ones: witness our modern era of ‘fake news’ and media spin where it becomes difficult to ascertain what is true any more.

The pigs also convince the other animals that they deserve to eat the apples themselves because they work so hard to keep things running, and that they will have an extra hour in bed in the mornings. In other words, they begin to become the very thing they sought to overthrow: they become like man.

They also undo the mantra that ‘all animals are equal’, since the pigs clearly think they’re not like the other animals and deserve special treatment. Whenever the other animals question them, one question always succeeds in putting an end to further questioning: do they want to see Jones back running the farm? As the obvious answer is ‘no’, the pigs continue to get away with doing what they want.

Squealer is Napoleon’s propagandist, ensuring that the decisions Napoleon makes are ‘spun’ so that the other animals will accept them and carry on working hard.

And we can draw a pretty clear line between many of the major characters in Animal Farm and key figures of the Russian Revolution and Stalinist Russia. Napoleon, the leader of the animals, is Joseph Stalin; Old Major , whose speech rouses the animals to revolution, partly represents Vladimir Lenin, who spearheaded the Russian Revolution of 1917 (although he is also a representative of Karl Marx , whose ideas inspired the Revolution); Snowball, who falls out with Napoleon and is banished from the farm, represents Leon Trotsky, who was involved in the Revolution but later went to live in exile in Mexico.

Squealer, meanwhile, is based on Molotov (after whom the Molotov cocktail was named); Molotov was Stalin’s protégé, much as Squealer is encouraged by Napoleon to serve as Napoleon’s right-hand (or right-hoof?) man (pig).

Publication

Animal Farm very nearly didn’t make it into print at all. First, not long after Orwell completed the first draft in February 1944, his flat on Mortimer Crescent in London was bombed in June, and he feared the typescript had been destroyed. Orwell later found it in the rubble.

Then, Orwell had difficulty finding a publisher. T. S. Eliot, at Faber and Faber, rejected it because he feared that it was the wrong sort of political message for the time.

The novella was eventually published the following year, in 1945, and its relevance – as political satire, as animal fable, and as one of Orwell’s two great works of fiction – shows no signs of abating.

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Animal Farm

Character textual response - benjamin dante di paolo 9th grade.

In the allegorical novel Animal Farm, George Orwell uses animals to represent humans or groups in Stalin's Russian Revolution. A character who is integral to the development of the storyline is Benjamin, an aged donkey. It is unclear which group or person in Stalin's Revolution Benjamin represents. However, one theory is that Benjamin is used to portray the sceptics living in the revolution, especially those who do not criticise Stalin's regime publicly. Orwell uses Benjamin to represent the sceptics as he is is strong minded, yet smart enough to keep his beliefs low profile so as not to face repercussions. His interactions with the other animals are typically abrupt and rude and he is not renowned for his hard work. However he is respected by all the animals. His stubbornness is evident throughout the text, and despite his rudeness he is undeniably loyal and helpful to those in need.

Throughout the novel, it becomes apparent that Benjamin is an extremely intelligent and mentally strong animal. Orwell states that Benjamin 'could read as well as any pig', which immediately leads the reader to assume that he is one of the, if not the, smartest animal on the farm. However this is not the only piece of evidence that suggests...

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• Animal Farm

George Orwell

• Literature Notes
• Major Themes
• Animal Farm at a Glance
• Book Summary
• About Animal Farm
• Character List
• Summary and Analysis
• Character Analysis
• Character Map
• George Orwell Biography
• Critical Essays
• The Russian Revolution
• Full Glossary
• Essay Questions
• Practice Projects
• Cite this Literature Note

Critical Essays Major Themes

Satire is loosely defined as art that ridicules a specific topic in order to provoke readers into changing their opinion of it. By attacking what they see as human folly, satirists usually imply their own opinions on how the thing being attacked can be remedied. Perhaps the most famous work of British satire is Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels (1726), where the inhabitants of the different lands Gulliver visits embody what Swift saw as the prominent vices and corruptions of his time. As a child,  Orwell discovered and devoured Swift's novel, which became one of his favorite books. Like Gulliver's Travels , Animal Farm is a satirical novel in which Orwell, like Swift, attacks what he saw as some of the prominent follies of his time. These various satirical targets comprise the major themes of Orwell's novel.

Broadly speaking, Animal Farm satirizes politicians, specifically their rhetoric, ability to manipulate others, and insatiable lust for power. Despite his seemingly altruistic motives, Napoleon is presented as the epitome of a power-hungry individual who masks all of his actions with the excuse that they are done for the betterment of the farm. His stealing the milk and apples, for example, is explained by the lie that these foods have nutrients essential to pigs, who need these nutrients to carry on their managerial work. His running Snowball off the farm is explained by the lie that Snowball was actually a traitor, working for Jones — and that the farm will fare better without him. Each time that Napoleon and the other pigs wish to break one of the Seven Commandments, they legitimize their transgressions by changing the Commandment's original language. Whenever the farm suffers a setback, Napoleon blames Snowball's treachery — which the reader, of course, knows is untrue. Napoleon's walking on two legs, wearing a derby hat, and toasting Pilkington reflect the degree to which he (and the other pigs) completely disregard the plights of the other animals in favor of satisfying their own cravings for power. Thus, the dominant theme of Animal Farm is the tendency for those who espouse the most virtuous ideas to become the worst enemies of the people whose lives they are claiming to improve.

Role of the Populace

Orwell, however, does not imply that Napoleon is the only cause for Animal Farm's decline. He also satirizes the different kinds of people whose attitudes allow rulers like Napoleon to succeed. Mollie , whose only concerns are materialistic, is like people who are so self-centered that they lack any political sense or understanding of what is happening around them. Apolitical people like Mollie — who care nothing for justice or equality — offer no resistance to tyrants like Napoleon. Boxer is likened to the kind of blindly devoted citizen whose reliance on slogans ("Napoleon is always right") prevents him from examining in more detail his own situation: Although Boxer is a sympathetic character, his ignorance is almost infuriating, and Orwell suggests that this unquestioning ignorance allows rulers like Napoleon to grow stronger. Even Benjamin , the donkey, contributes to Napoleon's rise, because his only stand on what is occurring is a cynical dismissal of the facts: Although he is correct in stating that "Life would go on as it had always gone on — that is, badly," he, too, does nothing to stop the pigs' ascension or even raise the other animals' awareness of what is happening. His only action is to warn Boxer of his impending death at the knacker's — but this is futile as it occurs too late to do Boxer any good.

Religion and Tyranny

Another theme of Orwell's novel that also strikes a satiric note is the idea of religion being the "opium of the people" (as Karl Marx famously wrote). Moses the raven's talk of Sugarcandy Mountain originally annoys many of the animals, since Moses, known as a "teller of tales," seems an unreliable source. At this point, the animals are still hopeful for a better future and therefore dismiss Moses' stories of a paradise elsewhere. As their lives worsen, however, the animals begin to believe him, because "Their lives now, they reasoned, were hungry and laborious; Was it not right and just that a better world should exist somewhere else?" Here, Orwell mocks the futile dreaming of a better place that clearly does not exist. The pigs allow Moses to stay on the farm — and even encourage his presence by rewarding him with beer — because they know that his stories of Sugarcandy Mountain will keep the animals docile: As long as there is some better world somewhere — even after death — the animals will trudge through this one. Thus Orwell implies that religious devotion — viewed by many as a noble character trait — can actually distort the ways in which one thinks of his or her life on earth.

False Allegiance

A final noteworthy (and again, satiric) theme is the way in which people proclaim their allegiance to each other, only to betray their true intentions at a later time. Directly related to the idea that the rulers of the rebellion (the pigs) eventually betray the ideals for which they presumably fought, this theme is dramatized in a number of relationships involving the novel's human characters. Pilkington and Jones ; Frederick , for example, only listen to Jones in the Red Lion because they secretly hope to gain something from their neighbor's misery. Similarly, Frederick's buying the firewood from Napoleon seems to form an alliance that is shattered when the pig learns of Frederick's forged banknotes. The novel's final scene demonstrates that, despite all the friendly talk and flattery that passes between Pilkington and Napoleon, each is still trying to cheat the other (as seen when both play the ace of spades simultaneously). Of course, only one of the two is technically cheating, but Orwell does not indicate which one because such a fact is unimportant: The "friendly" game of cards is a facade that hides each ruler's desire to destroy the other.

Thus, as Swift used fantastic places to explore the themes of political corruption in the eighteenth century, so Orwell does with his own fantastic setting to satirize the twentieth. According to Orwell, rulers such as Napoleon will continue to grow in number — and in power — unless people become more politically aware and more wary of these leader's "noble" ideals.

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• Animal Farm

Background of the Novella

Animal Farm was written by George Orwell from 1943-1945. It was published in 1945 in England and in 1946 in The United States. It sold more than 600,000 copies of this book  in The United States .

George Orwell wrote this novel to warn the people against the impacts and perils of Stalinism and totalitarian government.  This novel got published at the end of World War II. The book is an allegory and all the characters symbolize different historical characters. The original title of this allegorical novella was Animal Farm: A Fairy Tale. But when it was published in the United States, the subtitle A Fairy Tale was dropped.

This novel won a Retrospective Hugo Award in 1996. It is included in the 100 best English language novels from 1923 to 2005 by Time Magazine. It is at 46 th number in The Big Read poll by BBC and at 31 st on Modern Library List of Best 20 th Century Novels. It is also chosen for inclusion in the Great Books of the Western World.

 About the idea of the book, Orwell wrote that 

“I saw a little boy, perhaps ten years old, driving a huge carthorse along a narrow path, whipping it whenever it tried to turn. It struck me that if only such animals became aware of their strength we should have no power over them and that men exploit animals in much the same way as the rich exploit the proletariat. ”

Animal Farm deals with the group of animals who assume responsibility for the homestead they live on. The animals get tired of Mr. Jones who remains their master, so they attack him and expel him out of the farm.

When they are liberated from the dictator Jones, life on the homestead is useful for some time and there is a promise for a more joyful eventual fate of less work, better training and more nourishment. However, conflict arises as Napoleon and Snowball battle for the leadership of animals on the homestead. Napoleon holds onto power forcibly and winds up abusing the animals similarly as Farmer Jones does. The story closes with the pigs acting and dressing like the people which the animals expel from the farm.

Setting of the Novella

The Manor Farm is the setting of the novel. This farm is later called the Animal Farm. It is located somewhere in the English countryside. It is a small but an independent farm. The name of the farm suggests that it once belonged to the lord of the manor who might have been an aristocrat.

But at the start of the novel, the farm is under the control of drunkard lazy Mr. Jones. The Manor Farm also symbolizes Russia and some of the European countries which are now under the control of capitalists and the scenario is well set for a revolution of Communism. This farm also stands for the bloodshed and corruption of the Stalin era.

Historical Background

In 1917, two progressive upsets shock the world and Russia.  Russian monarchy is overthrown and the USSR is established which becomes the very first state that follows the principles of Communism.

Throughout the following 30 years, the Soviet government slips into an authoritarian system that controls communist thoughts of correspondence among the average workers to persecute its relatives and look after force. Animal Farm is a purposeful anecdote of the Russian Revolution and the Communist Soviet Union. Huge numbers of the animal characters in Animal Farm have direct relationships to figures or establishments in the Soviet Union.

Animal Farm Summary

Chapter 1 summary.

Mr. Jones is the owner of the animal farm. Mr. Jones is heavily drunk and he hardly makes it to bed. As he goes towards the bed, the animals start to make noise and bustle because they are to hold a grand meeting on the farm. The agenda of the meeting is to have a discussion about the strange dream of the Old Major. The animals are slowly showing up in the barn.

Three dogs arrive which include Jessie, Bluebell and Pincher. Afterwards, hens, pigs, cows, sheep, and the horses; Clover and Boxer come as well.  The donkey Benjamin and the goat Muriel do come as well. So many more animals arrive as well and Old Major starts the aim of the meeting by addressing all of them as Comrades. He wants to impart his knowledge because he thinks he is going to die soon. He thinks that animals are not free and they live in slavery and misery.

He thinks that they are not free because they are being subjugated by human beings. He thinks that human beings rob and plunder all the animals and when the animals are left with nothing to present to human beings, humans kill them or slaughter them. He also announces that the way to free life is that they need to start a rebellion movement.

He then asks all of them to vote whether they should go into the rebellion or not and the majority of them want freedom. He then shares his dream that the state of happiness for animals can be achieved once the man is eliminated.

Chapter 2 Summary

After the meeting, Old Major dies but the major thing he does is that he unites all the animals. After his death, animals start their preparation for the rebellion. Pigs are assigned the responsibility to gather the animals and teach them about the rebellion.

Napoleon, Snowball and Squealer start teaching the animals about the concept of Old Major which is Animalism. They expound the ideas of animalism to all the people. At the start, animals have mixed reactions towards the concept of Animalism; some think that the system would work while those who are on the side of Mr. Jones think that this system might not work. Slowly and gradually the animals start getting to the concept of Animalism.

In the meanwhile, Mr. Jones suffers economic losses and he gets engaged in excessive drinking. This loss of control provides the animals an opportunity to chalk out their plan of rebellion in a good way. One day, Mr. Jones is highly drunk and he is unable to feed the animals. So animals rush to the shelter and eat whatever is present. Mr. Jones and his men come to beat animals and they beat all the animals very hard. The animals attack the men and they all flee from the barn.

All the animals remove the boundaries of the farm and change the name of the from the Manor Farm to Animal Farm. The animals sleep well that night and believe that a good life is ahead of them.

They also reveal that the concept of Animalism has some basic tenants and they are:

•     Creatures that walk on two legs are our enemies.
•     Creatures with wings or four legs are friends.
•     Animals would not wear clothes like human beings.
•     They will not use beds for sleeping.
•     Animals would not drink alcohol.
•     Animals would not commit the killing of animals.
•     Animals of all sorts are equal.

Then they decide to harvest and start harvesting.

Chapter 3 Summary

The pigs supervise the harvest and the harvest is more successful than that of Mr. Jones although these animals do not have the tools for harvest. Animals start enjoying this life of freedom. All the animals work to their capacity on Animal Farm. Boxer is the one who works harder than the rest of the animals because he is big and strong. In Animalism, all the animals share their responsibilities and they seem satisfied with the system.

The day of  rest is Sunday. There is another meeting in which the flag of Animalism is raised. In the next meeting, they decide and plan the working schedules for the week.

The pigs help in making a room for study where trade is studied. Some Committees are made including The Clean Tails League, Re-Education Committee, and Egg Production Committee. But the committees are unable to produce the results. The animals do not have good intelligence and are unable to remember the seven features of Animalism so one basic commandment is made for them and it is “four legs good and two legs bad.”

Slowly, the pigs take control of the farms. For example, the pigs claim right over the ripe apples first. Pigs want more milk and apples for their brain because they are the ones who plan for anything. The animals want to stop these pigs but they are afraid that Mr. Jones might return if they are not united and they believe that they are united because of the pigs.

Chapter 4 Summary

Summer arrives and the word of the rebellion reaches the surrounding farms as well. Mr. Jones also informs the other farmers about his miseries and the rebellion of the animals. The farmers do not like each other but they are afraid that the same rebellions might take place in their respective farms as well so they all unite together to fight the animals. Some of the farmers advertise the news on their farm that the animals of the Animal Farm are starving because they do not have food. They think that such news would discourage the animals from rebelling. But the animals get the news that the word of the farmer is not true so the farmers then spread the news that the animals of the Animal Farm have turned out to be cannibals.

Animals of the other farms also start disobeying their owner and here and there they beat their owners. After some time, Mr. Jones gathers people to take possession of the Animal Farm. The animals are now trained for the war. The men attack with full strength but animals stand and defeat the men. Boxer and Snowball stand out as their heroes. Animals call the war the Battle of the Cowshed. They also give some honors to the animals as Boxer and Snowball are conferred upon ‘Animal Hero of First Class’ while the dead sheep is conferred the honor of Animal Hero of Second class, posthumously. They also decide to celebrate the anniversary of the battle every year on 12 th October.

Chapter 5 Summary

In the winter, the animals feel that Mollie is not performing the assigned duties. Mollie is also sympathetic towards humans and usually talks to humans at the borders of Animal Farm. It is also noted that Mollies has sugar and ribbon stash. After some time, Mollies disappears from the farm.

The weather becomes harsh in January and the animals hold many meetings to make some policies. They agree that the policies will be made by Pigs. In these meetings, Napoleon and Snowball come in contrary positions and they usually disagree with each other. Some of the animals support Napoleon, while others start supporting Snowball.

Over the issue of the windmill, both these animals develop a staunch conflict. Snowball designates the land where there will be a windmill that will provide the electricity to the farm and Snowball also makes the plan for it but Napoleon urinated on the documents of the plan.

Snowball suggests that animals will be able to complete the windmill in a year but Napoleon thinks that all the animals might die in one year if they do not focus on the production of food.  Some of the animals start chanting for the windmill, while the other chant for food production. Benjamin is the only animal who thinks that both plans are beneficial for animals.

There is preparation for another possible attack by the humans and Napoleon and Snowball again come in a debate. Napoleon is of the view to train the animals to use firearms while Snowball thinks other animals should be brought as well.

The blueprint for the windmill is completed and the majority decides for it but in the meanwhile, Napoleon brings nine dogs that chase Snowball but he manages to escape the farm. This gives an opportunity to Napoleon and he announces that on Sunday there will be a meeting.

In the meeting, the animals are not allowed and the pigs decide the schedule for the next week. Napoleon starts dictating all the other animals and decides that he will not only complete the windmill but will also carry out other welfare plans for the animals too.

Chapter 6 Summary

These animals start working to build the windmill and they work for sixty hours every week.  In the month of August, Napoleon announces that the animals may choose to come and work on Sundays for the windmill. He also declares that coming on Sunday is a choice of the animals but if they do not come they will get reduced rations.

The building work for the windmill is in full swing but there comes a shortage of materials on the farm and the animals are unable to produce these materials on the farm. They start thinking about the possible solutions and Napoleon comes up with the solution that the farm animals would trade with the farms of the neighborhood and sell some eggs of the hens. In the process of this trade, the animals have to make contact with human beings and this is contrary to the commandments of Animalism. The animals grow uneasy over the issue but Napoleon assures them that there will be no contact with human beings and that it is only done for the welfare of the animals. He then announces that on behalf of the animals of the farm a solicitor Mr. Whymper will work as an agent between the animals of the farm and the people of the town.

Slowly and gradually, the people of the town start accepting the existence of the Animal Farm although they do not like it. The pigs again come into the farm and the animals are uneasy with them but Squealer satisfies them that the pigs’ plan for the animals  He also convinces the animals that Napoleon being their master must live in the house rather than living with them.

One night, the windmill gets destroyed by the wind and there are some footprints of the pigs. Napoleon announces that this destruction is brought by Snowball.  He announces that Snowball must be brought to the farm for the death sentence and whoever brings him will be awarded honor.

Chapter 7 Summary

In the winter, the animals start working on the windmill again. They also face the scarcity of food but the plan that they will not allow humans to know about their misery because humans want the Animal Farm to fail. Due to the shortage of food, many of the animals do not eat and they remain hungry.

Napoleon does not appear in public frequently. He then makes a contract to sell around four hundred eggs every week.  The hens disagree with the decision but Napoleon stops their food and announces that whoever provides hens with the food will be given the death sentence. Hens surrender soon because in the span of a few days nine hens die in the farm.

The news is spread on the farm that Snowball comes to the farm at night and creates mischief. Napoleon announces to look for the traces of Snowball and to smell the smell of Snowball in the farm. News is also spread that Snowball has taken a position with the animals to take over the animal farm. Squealer tells the animals that Snowball is on the side of Mr. Jones and he has been on the side of Mr. Jones in the battle of Cowshed.

After a few days Napoleon orders for the assembly. He is wearing the awards of the battles. Some of the pigs have opposed the ideas of Napoleon and the dogs of Napoleon drag them out from the crowd. The pigs are forced to tell the animals of their activities and they confess that they are plotting with Snowball to take over the farm. They also confess that they have destroyed the windmill with the help of Snowball. Napoleon orders to kill the pigs and similarly some other animals are killed too. After the assembly, the animals are terrified and the Squealer comes to announce that the anthem of the Animal Farm is replaced with the new anthem by Napoleon.

Chapter 8 Summary

The animals grow uneasy over the matter that the animal farm is very much different than the one which Old Major advocated. Napoleon does not come to meet the public and the animals are forced to call Napoleon ‘our leader.’ The animals are made to believe that all the success and the development of the farm is due to Napoleon. Poems over the glories of Napoleon are also composed in the farm. Napoleon wants to sell the timber and the negotiations are carried on with Mr. Pilkington and Mr. Frederick. 

In summer, some hens are punished to death because of their plotting against the life of Napoleon. Thus the security of Napoleon increases. Napoleon sells the timber to Mr. Pilkington.

Another misfortune strikes the farm and the fields of wheat turn out as weeds. The windmill completes in the due course of time. The windmill is named Napoleon Mill. Napoleon then announces that he has a deal with Frederick of selling the timber. He also announces that he does not have a deal with Pilkington. He further announces that he told the animals about the deal with Pilkington because he wanted to raise the bid price. He also says that he is going to use the cash for purchasing machinery for the windmill.

He demands that the animals would investigate the note and it is found that the notes are unreal. He sentences death penalty for Frederick by boiling him alive. He then sends a word for Pilkington for a deal but he refuses. Frederick comes with his men and destroys the Windmill. The animals chase the attackers.  

The victory is named as the battle of the windmill. Napoleon titles himself as the Order of the Green Banner. One day, Pigs find Whiskey and after a few days, the squealer announces that Napoleon is about to die. His last words are that no one should drink alcohol. In the span of a few days, Napoleon is saved and he announces that they are going to make drinks.

Chapter 9 Summary

The winter comes and the ration of the animals is given to them in lower quantity but dogs and pigs are given the full quantity. Napoleon parents thirty-one pigs on the farm and decides to make a school for them. He announces that pigs are superior to other animals and they should be paid due respect. The pigs bloom in the farm and for the rest of the animals, the times are hard with low food and forced for more production. The end of the winter brings another announcement from Napoleon that the pigs will be given beer in their ration too and more than half of the drink would be taken by Napoleon.

In the month of April, Napoleon is elected as the president and the Animal Farm becomes the republic. One day, Boxer falls ill with the work and asks for his retirement. Napoleon announces that he will be sent to the hospital. A van with a man comes and takes Boxer. The animals get happy that Boxer will be alright soon but Benjamin tells them that the van has written letters which say that the van belongs to the doctor who sells the flesh and bones of the horses. The animals try to help Boxer but are unable to.

After a few days, it is announced that Boxer died in the hospital. Squealer tells them that the doctor has bought the van from the horse slaughterer but has not painted it yet. Napoleon announces that Boxer is going to be awarded. The night of the ceremony comes and animals learn that pigs have bought crates of whiskeys.

Chapter 10 Summary

The animals of the rebellion slowly die. Mr. Jones also dies in his home. Napoleon has grown fat. The farm becomes big because Napoleon purchases land. He also buys machinery for the farm. The windmill is used for milling the corn and they do not make electricity. There is no retirement for old animals. He also makes the animal build another windmill for electricity.

The dogs and pigs continue their life of luxury. The pigs buy telephones and have a magazine subscription. Animals start wearing human clothing. Humans are invited to the farm and the bad relations are finished. They start cooperating and trade with the humans and the visits of humans increase on-farm. Napoleon makes the animals work more and more. He gives them less food. The humans and pigs usually play poker games and they usually fight each other and there seems no differentiation between because the name  of the farm is replaced with The Manor Farm again.

Animal Farm Characters Analysis

He is a white boar. He is given the name of Willingdon Beauty by Mr. Jones. He is a wise character in the novel. For this intelligence, he is respected by all the animals of Jones` farm.

He is the senior among all the animals and is twelve years old. It is he who starts the course of action by calling a meeting at the very start of the novel. He gives the idea of Animalism to the animals of the farm so that they could spend a better life if freedom.

After his death, he is revered and his skull is placed with the flag of Animalism. He symbolizes Karl Marx. Karl Marx is the father of Marxist view and he states that the class division where the Bourgeoisies control the means of production and make the proletariat class work tirelessly should confront the revolution and reach the state of Communism where there will be equality for all.

He also represents Vladimir Lenin. He is the founding author of the Russian Revolution and the Soviet Union formation. After his death, Stalin and Trotsky developed a conflict for a leadership position and in the novel, it is shown through Napoleon and Snowball.

He is the leader of Animal Farm. He is one among the pigs. He is the only Berkshire Boar present on the farm. He is a true politician and makes the way for the expelling of Snowball.

He then takes over the animal farm. He time and again changes his commitments and decisions for his own benefits. He gives special privileges to pigs and dogs. Once he takes control of the farm, he goes against the commandments of animalism and starts wearing human clothes and eats in the dishes. He slowly goes away from public and does not mingle himself with the public.

He is the leader who is corrupt and feeds on the production of his subjects providing them nothing of benefit. For Orwell, Napoleon represents Napoleon Bonaparte. In the novel, the pig Napoleon represents Stalin because he also changed his policies and orders frequently.

Benjamin is the donkey in this novel. He is the oldest of the animals that are living on the farm. He shows stubbornness. He is the only animal beside pigs that can read.

In addition to this, he is an intelligent animal. He is very unfriendly throughout the novel but has a strong affiliation with Boxer. He remains the same before and after a period of Rebellion. He helps the animals on the farm to learn and write. He shows that life is hard but one needs to find ways to pass this life.

Benjamin also stands for Orwell himself because Orwell too remained pessimistic due to the political scenario and the totalitarian governments.

Boxer is the male horse that lives on the farm. He is the tallest and strongest of the animals on the farm. His appearance is not very good and his intelligence, too, is of the second class but he is respected for his strength and valor.

After the rebellion, he works more than the other animals. He becomes a supporter of Napoleon because he thinks that he needs to serve fellow animals. For the sake of the betterment of Animal Farm, he works hard and tirelessly.

He believes Napoleon blindly and when Squealer tells him that Napoleon has informed him that Snowball helped humans in the battle of Cowshed, he believes it directly although he knows that it is not the truth.

In the battle of Windmill, Boxer gets injured. He wants retirement. Squealer comes and announces that Napoleon is sending Boxer to hospital for treatment but instead he sells him to a horse slaughterer for profit. The money is then used by the pigs for drinking alcohol.

Boxer is an allegorical representation of the working class or the proletariats in human society. Although they have the strength and power to serve the bourgeoisie yet they lack the mental capabilities which make them understand that they can stand for their own rights.

This class of people does not understand the actual tactics of the propagandist governments and they suffer throughout their lives.

There are nine dogs which are parented by Napoleon. These are the same dogs that Napoleon makes to catch Snowball. These dogs are given special privileges along with the pigs.

In winters, when the ration of the animals is reduced and they starve because of the shortage of food, these dogs enjoy full food and luxuries of life. They are the main weapons of Napoleon and he uses them to tear apart the animals which are sentenced to death. These dogs are made the characters in this novel because they symbolize the agencies like KGB and NKVD.

Frederick is the owner of Pinchfield. Pinchfield is a small farm in the surroundings of the Manor Farm. He has a good business and is usually busy with legal issues. He makes a deal with Napoleon for the purchasing of timber but he cheats the animals by giving them unreal notes of banks.

Frederick symbolizes Adolf Hitler. This deal of timber also shows the non-aggression pact of Nazi-Soviet governments. His deceiving of the animals shows his betrayal of the Soviet government by launching an invasion in Soviet. The stories that are coming from the farm of Frederick portray that the Nazi government of Hitler is going to come hard on the people.

He is the owner of the animal farm. When he is the owner of the farm the name of the farm is The Manor Farm. He is a drunkard. Due to his habit of drinking, he does not feed the animals of the farm well so animals overthrow him by starting a rebellion movement against him. Animals defeat him in the battle and take his farm and gun. He tries to take the farm but is defeated again.

He then goes to another part of the country and dies there. He symbolizes a government that is flawed and corrupt. This sort of government gives way to revolutions and rebellions.

Pilkington owns the Foxwood Farm which is located near the Manor Farm. He is a good man and has great interest in his own lands. He marks the end of human-animal hostility and wants to make good cooperation between humans and animals.

He represents the allies. These allied countries traded with Soviet Union till World War II. But these allied countries remain reluctant at the start of the war to enter into it and in the novel, it is shown that Pilkington does not save the animals when Frederick and his men attack the animal farm.

In the end, the poker game between Pilkington and Napoleon represents the struggle for power in the Cold War era.

He is also a leader in the pigs. He is a young pig. He is an intelligent character but the only shortcoming in his character is that he does not have political depth which Napoleon possesses.

He symbolizes Leon Trotsky. Snowball aims to work for the betterment of the animal farm. He comes up with the plan of a windmill, which he thinks would prove very beneficial for the animals of the animal farm.

But before the windmill is built, Napoleon expels him from the animal farm. He then does not come to the animal farm but all those bad things which happen on the animal farm are associated with Snowball through Napoleon’s propagandist team of pigs. He is also accused of the idea that he is plotting against the animal farm to take revenge. Napoleon uses tactics of fear through the name of Snowball and takes complete control of the farm.

He is a poker pig. He is endowed with the art of arguments. He is known to be a person who can turn black into white and vice versa.

He acts as an agent of Napoleon. He brings the orders of Napoleon to the animals. He lies frequently to the animals and makes them forget the history by changing the history and modifying the events according to the wishes of Napoleon. He is a true propagandist in a totalitarian government.

He is a solicitor and works as an agent for the animals to make deals with the surrounding farms and human beings. He takes his commission from Napoleon. He makes visits to the animal farm on every Monday. He does not bother himself with injustices of the animal farm rather he is interested in his commission.

He is a sort of person who portrays the countries that made trade and deals with the Soviet Union but did not attempt to look into the cruelties of the government towards its subjects.

Themes in Animal Farm

Education used for oppression.

From the start of the novel, the readers are informed about the role of education in stratifying the population of Animal Farm. After the death of Major, the pigs being the clever animals assume the assignment of activating the animals.

In the start, the pigs are faithful to animals and to the progressive reason. They interpret Major’s vision of Animals loyally in the Seven Commandments. But soon they start oppressing the animals with their education and intelligence. When the pigs get the opportunity to get something material that they need, they desert their ethics and utilize their better keenness and information to mislead animals of the farms.

The pigs do not provide good opportunities for other animals to get education and knowledge. They instruct themselves from the books of the children to write and read. They are clever to the extent that they destroy the books once they read them.

This results in the fact that other animals do not learn anything. When pigs are accepted as a class of educated animals they start exploiting other animals.

For instance, they know that the animals are unable to read so they change the commandments of Animalism whenever they want to remold them according to their need. The pigs employ their proficiency to take in exchanges from manuals, which give them an open door for financial specialization. They are satisfied with the job of the intellectual elite, the pigs avoid physical work.

This shows that they are also opportunists. The education and the intelligence of pigs permit them to subdue the rest of the animals of the farm. At the end of the book, the readers witness Napoleon’s arrangements for the education of a new generation of pigs so that they could continue to subdue the animals of the farm.

Violence as a tool of Suppression

In Animal Farm, Orwell reprimands the manners in which the tyrants use fear and viciousness to subdue their subjects. Savagery is one element from which the animals want to get rid and thus they prepare for the Rebellion.

The fact is that Mr. Jones makes the animals work more and he kills them as well whenever he wants to. When the pigs start controlling the animals the way Jones did it, they get to the real help of fear and brutality. They exploit this information to their full potential benefit. The preeminent case of brutality and dread in the novel is an example of open executions.

The executions represent the Great Purge and the Red Terror, yet they stand for the maltreatment of intensity. For instance, they are like the open executions of Taliban in Kabul, Afghanistan.

The death penalty for crooks is a fervently discussed issue. Executing lawbreakers like Napoleon is another issue. The executions symbolize the Trails of Moscow which Stalin arranged to make the people afraid. The traitors were forced to confess so that they could be executed.

In the novel, Napoleon forces the animals to confess so that he could execute them. Orwell’s utilization of the moral story sorts him well in the execution scene. Execution with weapons is a vicious and appalling act. However, numerous individuals have become desensitized to it. Orwell’s symbolic killers, the dog that murders savagely depicts the wicked and inevitably bestial side of execution.

Fear is brought through propaganda and dangers. Every time the animals set out to scrutinize a part of Napoleon’s system, Squealer compromises them with the return of Mr. Jones. This means threatening the animals since it would mean another fight, and the defeat of the fight would bring about their previous life under the control of Mr. Jones.

The return of Mr. Jones is a serious risk because it kills the interests of animals in questioning. The other significant case of dread strategies in the novel is the danger of Snowball and his colleagues. Napoleon uses Snowball`s return as the cause of fear because he makes them believe that his return is dangerous. Snowball is a more awful danger than Jones since Jones is at any rate securely out of Animal Farm. Snowball is demonstrated to be sneaking along the boundaries of Animal Farm.

Napoleon’s open examination of Snowball’s whereabouts concretes the fear of the animals for the dangerous impact of Snowball.

Class Stratification

The animal farm is corrosive satire not only at the corruption in the era of Stalin but it also holds a mirror to the human tendency and inclination towards class the development of class stratification and the bad impacts of class division.

The novel sheds light on the fact the various animals representing various classes are one against the enemy but once the peril of elimination and enemy is eliminated, the unity of the classes goes away and they start dividing themselves into different groups.

Once Mr. Jones is removed from the leadership of the farm, a run for leadership is shown among the animals of the farm and Napoleon being the main manipulator becomes the leader to exploit all the animals. The animals divide themselves as the working class and the other class who control the working class. The pigs are classified into the class that holds all the privileges and the rest of the animals on the farm constitute the working class and they work tirelessly. This class is given no proper food and shelter while the pigs enjoy every luxury of the farm.

Through this novella, Orwell highlights the fact that it is the tendency of Humans that they have divided themselves into groups and classes because they cannot remain in freedom. They want to get subjugated by another class and it is happening throughout the world.

Naive Working Class and its dangers

The novels present both the classes very powerfully and meticulously: the controlling class and the oppressive class. The novel does not present the perspective of any particular but it portrays the panoramic view of all the characters. It is in fact narrated through the perspective of every ordinary animal.

The animals that are hardworking and loyal gives Orwell an opportunity to highlight that oppression does not only through the control tactics of the upper class but through the naivetés of the suppressed class.  The oppression happens because this oppressed class is not educated and not informed and this lack of knowledge causes the oppression and opportunity to the control class to suppress the oppressed. 

Boxer states that Napoleon is always right and this is a clear indication which gives Napoleon more strength and power to subdue this class of animal. This novel manifests that the inability of the oppressed increases the suffering of this class because they are unable to make progress in order to free themselves from the tyrant and cruel masters.

The Failure of Intellect

Animal Farm is profoundly doubtful about the estimation of scholarly movement. The pigs are distinguished as the canniest creatures. However, their insight rarely delivers anything of significant worth.

Rather, the pigs utilize their insight to control and misuse different creatures. The novella recognizes a few different manners by which knowledge neglects to be valuable or acceptable. Benjamin is educated, yet he will not peruse, proposing that knowledge is useless without the ethical sense to take part in governmental issues and the fearlessness to act. The dogs are almost as proficient as the pigs.

However, they are not keen on pursuing anything aside from the Seven Commandments. The dogs’ utilization of their insight recommends that acumen is pointless when it is joined with a character that likes to obey orders as opposed to addressing them.

Animal Exploitation by Humans

Animal Farm makes progressively strict contention like people abuse and mistreats animals. While the creatures’ resistance is generally funny in tone, it finishes on a genuine and touching note, when the creatures clear out the last hints of Jones’ loathed rule.

The outfit room toward the end of the stables was torn open; the bits, the nose-rings, the pooch chains, the barbarous blades with which Mr. Jones had been utilized to mutilate the pigs and sheep, were completely flung down the well.

The novella proposes that there is a genuine association between the abuse of creatures and the misuse of human specialists. Mr. Pilkington jokes to Napoleon that on the off chance that you have your lower creatures to fight with we have our lower classes. From the perspective of the decision class, creatures and laborers are the equivalents.

Animal Farm Analysis

Stalinism satirized.

This novel is a satire of extremist governments of totalitarian governments in their numerous pretenses. Orwell formed this book for an explicit reason: to stand as a cautionary tale of warning against Stalinism.

Therefore, he was unable to publish this book because the Allies were helping out the Soviet Union. Although the book got ready for publishing yet Orwell could not get any publisher for the book to publish it. The characters of this novel portray some authentic figures and various groups of Imperial Russian and Soviet society. The Major stands for Karl Marx, the Boxer for the workers, Napoleon stands for Joseph Stalin, Frederick for Adolf Hitler, and Snowball stands for Leon Trotsky.

The similarity of the incidents of this novel and event in the history of Soviet is unquestionable. For instance, Napoleon and Snowball conflict is an immediate reference to that of Stalin and Trotsky’s. The agreement of trade between Napoleon and Frederick and then breaking it represents a non-aggression pact between Nazi and Soviets before World War II. The Battle of the Windmill shows World War II.

Regardless of this fantasy story composed for satirizing some of the events Soviet history Orwell is less concerned about other events of history. For instance, the killing in Chapter VII associates the Great Purge and the Red Terror. The executions are the representation of these events. Squealer’s declarations that the executions have finished the Rebellion associate them to the time of the Red Terror.

Orwell leaves some vagueness in the characters of the Rebellion and the Battle of the Cowshed. These obscurities in the events help the audience concentrate the satire focused on Stalinism and the dangers of the totalitarian government.

Napoleon Analyzed

From the initial points in the novella, Napoleon rises as a person who is always in search of opportunities for corruption.  Napoleon never makes a solitary commitment by participating actively in the Revolution, not to the definition of its belief system, not to the grisly battle that it requires, not to the new society’s underlying endeavors to build up itself. He never shows enthusiasm for the quality of Animal Farm itself, just in the quality of his control over it.

Therefore, the main venture he embraces with excitement is the preparation of a litter of little dogs. He doesn’t teach them so that the dog could benefit themselves or to benefit all the animals of the farm but he teaches them for his own advantages. They become Napoleon`s private armed force for the sake of controlling the animals of the farm.

In spite of the fact that he straightforwardly demonstrates Joseph Stalin, Napoleon symbolizes the political dictators that have risen all through the history of mankind and with specific recurrence during the twentieth century. He is not the French Napoleon in the novel but he matches all the features of Napoleon Bonaparte who sells all the democratic commandments and this is the same which Napoleon of Animal Farm does, in order to control the animals of the farm.

One by one, he changes all the seven commandments of Animalism for his own benefits. It is a demonstration of Orwell’s intense political insight that Napoleon can without much of a stretch represent any of the extraordinary despots and political rascals in world history, even the individuals who emerged after Animal Farm was composed. In the conduct of Napoleon and his partners in crime, one can identify the lying and tormenting strategies of authoritarian pioneers, for example, Mao, Josip Tito, Augusto Pinochet, Pol Pot and Milosevic are treated in a very corrosive manner.

Some Animals are more equal than others

In Animal Farm various types of animals have various capacities and intelligence levels. The dogs and the pigs are the best because of their education, while Boxer and a large portion of different creatures are not educated and they do not have intelligence.

These varying degrees of training are reflected in the chain of command that in the long run rises on Animal Farm. The dogs and the pigs on top, Boxer and the other animals lower than pigs and dogs. One understanding of the divergence in insight among creatures is that a few animal varieties, for example, pigs are bound to govern, while the lower creatures are bound to endure. In the event that this phenomenon is accepted, at that point class divisions arise in the novella.

Animal Farm demonstrates that the intelligence of the pigs is not the main tool through which they control the other animals of the farm because pigs do not produce anything that is beneficial for the animals of the farms.

Snowball’s greatest thought is the plan of building the windmill but it makes the animals lose several years for building it. The intelligence of the pigs used to exploit the lower creatures. Squealer utilizes his aptitude with words to give tricky clarifications for Napoleon’s falsehoods. Napoleon exhibits knowledge in preparing his dogs for security and this proves to be the only time when Napoleon shows his knowledge.

Simultaneously, Muriel and Benjamin are as proficient as the pigs yet never accomplish any force whatsoever. The lack of political force of Muriel and Benjamin proposes that it isn’t the knowledge of the pigs which gives them at the highest point of the chain of command, but it is their education with the mix of their manipulative power that gives them the highest ranks.

Animal Farm recommends that the genuine wellspring of intensity on the Farm might be Boxer. He is the person who fights the human farmer very bravely and defeats them exhibits that  Boxer could devastate the dogs of Napoleon. So the idea that some animals are more equal than the others is the unity of dogs and pigs in terms of their knowledge and manipulative power that gives them the autonomy of the farm.

Power Corrupts

Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely is reverberated all through Animal Farm. This novel shows that the battle for power is profoundly established in debasement. This is demonstrated by depicting that power can’t be achieved without it. Whenever a person achieves power and he tastes the power, he craves more and more power which creates a sense of superiority and manipulation of others in such a person.

These thoughts inalienably demonstrate that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely because power once achieved finds its sources of corruption itself.

The very first thing, Animal Farm shows that force can’t be accomplished without defilement. The characters that are aggressive and hungry for power are reflected through their utilization of corrupt intentions to raise their status.

In Animal Farm, we see this via Snowball’s persuasiveness in convincing the animals for the windmill but Napoleon stands up and nine dogs run straight to chase Snowball.

Through this utilization of striking symbolism, we see that Napoleon is making sure about force by dispensing his opposition through fierce methods instead of really substantiating himself as the more fitting competitor. Snowball is the predominant speaker and convinces the animals with his discourse for the windmill but Napoleon resorts to brutality to affirm his strength, demonstrating that force can’t be accomplished without defilement.

The need for debasement to accomplish power in Animal Farm is observed when the animals look outside where pigs play games with humans, they look at pigs and then at humans again they look at humans and then at pigs but there seems no difference in them.

Through the reiteration, we see that with regards to achieving power, the pigs are similarly overbearing as the people and that defilement is a typical factor between all figures hungry for power, including pigs and human beings. Subsequently, Animal Farm shows that force can’t be accomplished without debasement so power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Besides, the novel confirms that once power is tasted, the individual or organization pines for additional feel for more power. Force can’t be accomplished without debasement, so to gain more power would require higher defilement. Since they keep on longing for power that is more than they already have, defilement would increment until they effectively arrive at supreme force and outright debasement.

In Animal Farm, it is made a rule that pigs should be given respect and path when they meet the other animals on the way. Furthermore, all pigs, on Sundays, have the luxury to wear wearing green stripes on their tails. George Orwell delineates that as their control over the farm expands, the pigs become narrow-minded and make rules for personal benefits because they are hungry for power to have a higher status. This is also witnessed in the novel when the pigs announce that they are to live in the house of humans and wear clothes like humans. This is a clear indication of their show of status on Animal Farm.

Failure of the Farm

The social differences and class divisions in The Animal Farm cause its downfall. The pigs take the superior position on the farm because they are educated while the other animals are on the lower position because of their illiteracy. The classes have a difference in education which makes pigs thinkers while the other animals become the workers.

With an atmosphere of division into classes, the farm has to fail because there is weakness in the atmosphere of the farm as it lacks unity and equality. There is a very large group of animals and they are supposed to be stronger but the division of the animals makes them vulnerable and the plot of this novel showcases the class differences in the society of this farm.

“I will work hard” is one of the sayings that the animals usually chant. In spite of the fact that this statement is short, it says a great deal regarding the legislature of The Animal Farm. It depicts the residents of the farm as the regular workers buckling down for their administration. The animals work hard until they are unable to continue the work in the same fashion.

At the point when Old Major talks about the rebellion in the farm, he tells Boxer that the day his incredible muscles lose their capacity to work, Jones is going to offer him to the slaughter. This clarifies the functioning of The Animal Farm. Pigs who are the upper class bring an idea to the farm and the lower class of working animals are supposed to complete the idea.

While the pigs are blessed with the food, drinks and luxury, the rest of the animals are hand to mouth on the farm.  When the animals come to a stage of life where they are of no use, the pigs sell them and enjoy the whiskeys over the money received.

A case of class division in Animal Farm is seen in the issue of apples and milk. The pigs claim that the milk and apples should be stored for them only because they plan the functioning of the farm. When the animals want to protest Squealer says that the pigs do not like milk and apples but they are eating them because they want to remain healthy for the sake of the animals because they are only animals who are educated and can help the farm move ahead.

The pigs lie to the other animals and manipulate the innocent animals because they want to have these luxuries and at the same time they want to make the animals believe that pigs belong to the higher class. This clearly shows the air corruption and class division taking its roots in the animal farm.

Once Snowball is exiled from the farm by the political strategies and then the violent attack of Napoleon through his dogs, certain negative narratives are made after Snowball.  The news is spread that Snowball visits the farm frequently to make things wrong for the animal farm. 

It is accepted that Snowball has offered himself to Pinchfield farms and is trying to take revenge by taking control of the animal farm. Squealer and his allies make the animals believe that Snowball is a traitor. Squealer convinces the animals that Snowball is on the side of the humans and he has cheated them in the Battle of Cowshed by acting on the signals of Mr. Jones. By this announcement, the privileged class exploits the lower class by targeting their weakness. This propaganda is also harmful to the reign of Napoleon towards the end.

After the publicly killing of four pigs, three sheep, three hens, and a goose, the residents of the animal farm realize that something is going wrong with the sixth commandments.  They come to know that the sixth commandment of Animalism is changed from No Animal shall kill any other animal to no animal shall kill any other animals without a cause. 

The animals do not remember these two words at the end of the sixth commandment but when they read it they believe that Napoleon does not go in contradiction to the commandments of Animalism. This is another case of the propaganda of Napoleon which conveyed to degenerate the psyches of the lower class animals.

Thus, this shows that the animal farm which is established to function as a unit of equal animals and the motive of the rebellion is to make all the animals equal by giving them equality is foreshadowed by class differences. The leaders, pigs, exploit the working class, animals, for their personal gains. This makes Animal Farm a failed state.

Propaganda as a tool for exploitation

George Orwell’s Animal Farm is a moral story for the Russian Revolution. In this novel, the pigs take control through numerous propagandist methods.

Under the reign of Stalin in Russia, the government abused general society through the compelling utilization of publicity, making the lives of the masses miserable. Individuals in communist states are defenseless against administrative control since they surrender individual belongings and individual opportunities, following their leaders blindly who exploit them.

Thus, in Orwell’s Animal Farm where animals take control of the far and set their own state in function. Napoleon, a pig, and his main propagandist, Squealer, subdue the animals completely. The use of propaganda by various characters reflects Russia in the reign of Stalin’s imperious guideline.

Both these take control through various techniques with the help of propaganda. Orwell`s focal message is that in a communist state the masses are controlled and this gives them the power to manipulate these masses.

In this novel, the characters chant various slogans to embed messages into the brains and hearts of the animals of the farm. The use of slogans by propagandists is to spellbind and motivate the crowd.

Napoleon uses these slogans to overwhelm the contentions made by Snowball or to change the subject when animals of the farm start to scrutinize his authenticity. Squealer deliberately makes the sheep intrude in Snowball’s discourses at various times in the contention with this apparent animalist trademark.

Although the sheep perform well, they are not aware that Squealer is manipulating them, too. With this example, Orwell exhibits that slogans are effective and dangerous instruments to manipulate the lower classes by the superior class. The slogans of Squealer go deep into the heart of Boxer, who frequently murmurs ground-breaking slogans to persuade himself and his friends. His avocation, that, if friend Napoleon said something, it must be valid, represents how a powerful figure is followed by the followers.

Generally, he turns into Squealer`s pawn. Since Squealer can’t reach everywhere anytime, he abuses Boxer’s numbness and reliability to certify Napoleon’s concern for animals of the farm. Fighter does this subliminally; he controls the animals for Napoleon without being aware of it. Through this Orwell suggests that the use of slogans by characters without any resistance spread the ideas very quickly.

In Animal Farm, Orwell utilizes Napoleon and Squealer to show another viable propagandist procedure: speaking to fear. This dread convinces the majority to follow the instructions of the pigs.

This fear is more openly spread on the farm by the dogs of Napoleon. At the point when Napoleon needs to remove Snowball, he takes help of the dogs. These dogs then bark on the animals that are planning to show any sort of resistance. This use of force is successful to control the animals to follow the leadership of Napoleon. Squealer uses progressively incendiary types of speaking to control these animals on the farm.

At the point when the condition requires a milder methodology, Squealer utilizes mental dread. Squealer abuses the animals through the fear of Jones that life remained miserable in his leadership. He makes the animals believe that if they do not follow Napoleon, Jones might return. Thus this threat of fear gives more power to pigs in the novel.

Orwell’s allegorical story Animal farm for the Russian Revolution shows how the viable utilization of propaganda empowers the hazardous control of the majority. In communism, everything is in control of government so the masses are vulnerable to the moves and instincts of governments. These classes who exploit: use propaganda to exploit the masses.

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Home › Key Theories of Walter Benjamin

Key Theories of Walter Benjamin

By NASRULLAH MAMBROL on February 19, 2017 • ( 3 )

Walter Benjamin (1892–1940), best known for a text called The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction where the world of mass produced artworks, in particular those of photography and film, are explored. Benjamin is also regarded as an iconic intellectual of the twentieth century, who blurred the boundaries of many traditionally isolated subject areas, from the impact of modernity to the meaning of Mickey Mouse. Benjamin was born on 15 July 1892 in Berlin; he was educated at Kaiser Friedrich Schule in Berlin, and at the Landerziehungsheim Haubinda in Thuringia where, significantly, he came into contact with the charismatic school reformer Gustav Wyneken , an important figure in Benjamin’s youth. The German youth movements – via Wyneken’s mediation – inspired Benjamin, and he became a member of the radical ‘group for school reform’ at Albert Ludwig University in Freiburg im Breisgau, also joining the committee of the Free Students Union during his time at the Royal Freidrich Wilhelm University in Berlin. While the youth movements led him to some passionate early publications in journals such as Der Anfang (The Beginning), Benjamin’s academic career did not lead to the expected result of a professorial position: he completed his doctoral dissertation in 1919 (published the following year as The Concept of Criticism in German Romanticism) and worked on his post-doctoral dissertation, or Habilitation, on the German Baroque mourning play, which he completed in 1925, eventually withdrawing it from the University of Frankfurt after an extremely negative reception. The Habilitation called the Ursprung des deutschen Trauerspiels (The Origin of German Tragic Drama) was eventually published in 1928, alongside a radically different text, the Einbahnstrasse (One Way Street) , which is virtually the opposite of a university dissertation, utilizing playful montage techniques and linguistic games.

Benjamin’s early writings are deeply metaphysical and theological, and are renowned for their philosophical density. In essays such as ‘On Language as Such and on the Language of Man’ (1916), ‘On the Program of the Coming Philosophy’ (1918) and the substantial  ‘The Concept of Criticism in German Romanticism’ (1920), Benjamin presents interlinked concepts of language, sacred text, a projected reworking of Kant’s limited concept of experience, and a new approach to criticism and Romanticism as a tracing of the absolute in early Romantic writing. Benjamin argued for an ‘immanent criticism’ which would engage in some ways quite mystically with a text’s internal structures and divine traces. This very early work can be compared with the popular English translation of Benjamin’s selected essays, collected under the title Illuminations, which show Benjamin theorizing modernity by bringing together, among other things, Marxist dialectics, Surrealism, snippets of theology, Baudelaire’s poetry (and, most importantly, his theories of the flâneur), Kafka’s novels, the image of Proust, a Klee painting called the Angelus Novus, book-collecting, translation, storytelling, photography and film. In this heterogeneous world, old and new collide, the material and the spiritual intersect, industrial modes of production have an impact upon, and transform irrevocably, the making and reception of art, and philosophical grand narratives are broken into small pieces: essays, radio shows, images and fragments.

Illuminations shows how though starting with deep metaphysical and theological perspectives, Benjamin’s thinking was radically modified by his own encounters with Marxism and Surrealism, leading to a hybrid approach to the analysis of contemporary culture. The flâneur – the bourgeois subject strolling idly through the new city-spaces of modernity – is more than a mobile spectator: his very identity is constituted by the physiological charges and shocks of the city, and his enjoyment of the commodification of all subjects. The fast-paced, ever-changing experiences of the city are reflected in new artistic production processes and forms, those of photography and film. Where once the unique high art forms dominated, now, for Benjamin, the mass-produced realm of the copy had come into its own, neutralizing the traditional concepts of individual creativity, genius, eternal value and mystery. Where once the work of art had a unique aura, in part generated by the venerating approach of the subject to the work, fixed in its unique location, now the mass-produced work comes to the subject, meeting her halfway. For example, radio, television and now the internet come directly into the home, and mass-produced works are available and consumed much of the time through ubiquitous advertising. Both ‘high’ and ‘low’ art forms are treated by Benjamin as viable objects of collecting and critical study, but new mass-produced works are not secondary to previous forms: the new techniques can achieve things that the old could not, e.g. slow-motion photography or digital images. The ‘copy’ thus outperforms the ‘original’ and does away with this outmoded binary opposition. New technologies of image (re)production de-couple or detach mass-produced art from the sphere of tradition, and from the ritualistic practices in which ‘high’ art is embedded. Instead of achieving significance through sacred ritual, art becomes a political practice. Benjamin adds to this argument his study of history, Marxism and Surrealism, to develop the concept of the ‘dialectical image’ that, as with Surrealist images, substitutes a political for a historical view of the past. Surrealist ‘profane illumination’ is a process whereby all human experiences are revealed to have revolutionary potential: this is revealed via a dialectics of shock, intoxication, the blurring of real and dream worlds, and linguistic experimentation, combined with a radical concept of freedom. Inspired by the ‘profane illumination’, which Benjamin thought exceeded the Surrealist’s grasp, Benjamin went on to develop his ‘dialectical image’ or ‘dialectics at a standstill’ in a massive work of collecting called The Arcades Project. This history of the nineteenth-century Paris arcades, creatively triggered by Louis Aragon’s (1897–1982) Le Paysan de Paris or Paris Peasant (1926), collects thousands of quotations strategically arranged with snippets of critical commentary in chapters or bundles called ‘convolutes’. The materials in each convolute form a critical constellation – or esoteric pattern – whereby the collective dreamworlds of nineteenth-century commodity capitalism are given form and are explosively shattered: the collective can thereby awaken from its non-dialectical slumbers (at least, that is the theory).

Benjamin’s last work – his essay ‘On the Concept of History’ (known previously in English as the ‘Theses on the Philosophy of History’) brings together many strands in his oeuvre: a critique of the Enlightenment (and subsequently capitalist) concept of ‘history as progress’, a melancholic analysis of the crisis-bound twentieth century, and the persistence of the theological and the messianic in the midst of the Marxist attempts to develop historical materialism (a rejection of universal truths, and the notion that such truths are teleological, that is to say, moving towards a pre-determined endpoint or goal). For oppressed peoples, Benjamin argues, the ‘state of emergency’ (say, the oppression of a particular ethnic group) is not a lived exception but the rule: adapting this lesson to historical materialism means constantly reassessing the present via past events and emergencies. The past is not something that is hermetically sealed and contained, it must constantly be re-addressed and re-conceptualized as it is dangerously appropriated by the ruling classes at any moment; thus Benjamin argues that: ‘Each age must strive to wrest tradition away from the conformism that is working to overpower it.’ The most infamous image from this final work is the angel in Klee’s Angelus Novus (a painting that Benjamin owned); Benjamin calls this image ‘the angel of history’ and imagines history here as a series of catastrophic events piling wreckage at this angel’s feet as he is blown into the future by the storm that human beings call ‘progress’.

Benjamin is one of the key thinkers of modernity, and an important figure on the margins of the Frankfurt School and other schools of Marxist criticism . While his experimental techniques, and essays on film and popular culture have been the most influential in the West, recent new English translations of a wider range of his work, in particular The Arcades Project, have led to considerable new interest in Benjamin in the English-speaking world. Much of Benjamin’s work is firmly rooted in metaphysics, however, and this aspect of his work continues to be troubling in the post-metaphysical humanities and, in some cases, is simply ignored.

Source: FIFTY KEY LITERARY THEORISTS by Richard J. Lane, Routledge Publication.

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Tags: Einbahnstrasse (One Way Street) , Frankfurt School , Georg Lukacs , Gustav Wyneken , History and Class Consciousness: Studies in Marxist Dialectics , Literary Theory , Marxism , On the Concept of History , The Concept of Criticism in German Romanticism , The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction , Ursprung des deutschen Trauerspiels (The Origin of German Tragic Drama) , Walter Benjamin.

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The History of Moscow City

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