Book Report Unit One

1) Title of Work: Animal Farm

2) Author and Date Written: George Orwell (Eric Arthur Blair), Written from 1943 to Early 1944

3) Country of Author: England (Born in Bengal, India)

4) Characters:

● Major:

○ Mr Jones - Mr Jones is an aggressive drunkard, who was no good to the animals on the
farm. He ends up being kicked off of the animal farm and ends up spending the rest of his
life drinking before he dies, sad and alone.
○ Apathetic - From the beginning, Jones has always thought of himself and only himself.
The whole reason he was overthrown by the animals in the first place was because of his
horrible mistreatment of them, and because he had spent the night getting drunk,
forgetting to feed them. He’s completely unable to care for anyone, always off drinking
alone.
○ Incompetent - Jones was never much of a worker, and didn’t do that much at all from
day to day. The first sentence of the entire book describes Mr Jones being too lazy and
drunk to properly shut the doors to the hen house. This incompetence, paired with his
Apathy, makes Jones out as the perfect example of a lazy tyrant.

○ Napoleon - Napoleon, the dictator pig of the Animal Farm, is defined by his never ending
thirst for power, and his tactics to manipulate the other animals around him. Although he
appears helpful at the beginning, Napoleon is a character who’s corruption increases
exponentially as time goes on.
○ Corruption - Napoleon slowly but steadily ends up becoming more and more human and
selfish as the book moves forward. At the beginning of the book, his actions are more
well hidden; small things such as putting the cows milk in the pig trough, or moving him
and the pigs into Mr. Jones’ house. By the end of the book, however, Napoleon has
become almost human in his actions, completely defying the founding rules of the farm,
but still claims himself to be righteous.
○ Manipulation - By using his higher intelligence, as well as recruiting the help of
Squealer, Napoleon often messes with the way of life in the farm to get his own way. One
of the main things Napoleon takes advantage of is the illiteracy of most of the animals.
Starting with changing the Fourth Commandment to “No animal shall sleep in a bed with
sheets,” by the end of the book, the pigs had completely erased the once unchangeable
 commandments and left only one, altered to fit their needs: “All animals are equal, but
some animals are more equal than others.

○ Old Major - Major was a well respected boar amongst the farm animals, and the first to
give the idea of rebellion to the animals. Wise and good willed, this final act of his before
he died soon after would put the entire book into motion.
○ Inspiring - described in the book as “So highly regarded on the farm that everyone was
quite ready to lose an hour’s sleep to hear what he had to say”, Old Major was a perfect
example of a great leader. Taking inspiration from a dream he had, Major managed to stir
the entirety of the farm animals into supporting a rebellion, teaching everyone a song
which would end up spreading across all of England.
○ Naive - The only thing that Old Major didn’t understand was that animals could also be
evil. Throughout his big speech at the beginning of the book, Old Major makes it very
clear in his words that he believes once humans are gone, no bad shall happen again on
the farm; and yet, by the end of the story, the entirety of the pigs have become corrupt
and act the same as those humans who they rebelled against so long ago. Although his
ideas technically made sense in theory, Major should’ve known that not all animals are
purely good.

○ Snowball - A good willed, hardworking leader of the rebellion, Snowball looked only to
do what was best for the farm. His final plan, the windmill, was eventually put into action
by his nemesis, Napoleon, after he was chased out of the farm.
○ Passionate - Snowball’s mindset was always what the Seven Commandments originally
intended, to help all those on the farm and make sure that everyone was happy. Snowball
acts as the teacher of the animals in the beginning, and helps even the least intelligent of
animals understand the commandments by coining the term “Four legs good, Two legs
bad”. Even the windmill, his last idea before being chased off of the farm, would’ve
provided only good for his comrades.
○ Intelligent - Snowball is arguably the smartest of the animals on the farm, both in battle
and in technology. Starting with battle, Snowball, who was literate from very early on,
had gone to books that described Julius Caesar’s campaigns, and was thus able to
properly defend the farm with complex maneuvers none of the other animals would have
been able to pull off alone. Snowball also learnt many important things on technology in
the books he delved into, which resulted in him coming up with plans for a fully
developed windmill all by himself.

○ Boxer - A horse with impressive strength, but who proves to be intellectually and
emotionally gullible. Boxer fails to recognize Napoleon’s true nature until too late,
basically brainwashing himself by repeating the slogan “Napoleon is always right” over
and over to himself (As well as his own motto, “I will work harder.”) Despite his good
 intentions, his loyalty would end up dooming him in the new cut throat world that is
Animal Farm.
○ Hard Working - Boxer’s personality trait most noticed by the animals around him is his
overwhelming strength and unbelievable work ethic. Getting up 15 minutes early daily
(which ends up changing to earlier through the book), Boxer would toil day after day to
help his fellow animals. When the animals are building the windmill, Boxer takes it upon
himself to pull up extra boulder pieces all by himself, which no other animal could ever
attempt.
○ Innocent - Boxer’s incredible strength is paralleled by his very minimal intelligence, and
his belief in most things he is told. For example, most of the other intelligent species of
animals were able to learn the entirety of the alphabet quite quickly; Boxer, however, was
never able to make his way past the letter D. To try and help himself with this, he would
often shorten important things to easy to remember sayings. However, these sayings
would end up spelling his doom. One of Boxer’s slogans which he would constantly
repeat to himself was “Napoleon is always right”, which he would use often to justify
anything Napoleon was doing. This naiveness is held throughout his life, even up until
just before his death at the glue factory.

○ Squealer - Napoleon’s right hand pig, Squealer would constantly use his incredible
persuasiveness to his and Napoleon’s benefit. No matter how selfish or bad things
seemed, Squealer could always, as the book says, “Turn black into white”.
○ Persuasive - Squealer often took advantage of his incredible skill at changing people’s
minds to make sure everyone stayed on Napoleon’s side. Whenever there was an issue,
such as the pigs taking the milk or sleeping in human beds, Squealer would most
commonly use two of his most famous arguments: “We are doing this for your sake,” and
“You don’t want Jones to come back, do you?” By using these arguments, Squealer was
able to take advantage of the less intelligent animals, for they didn’t understand much of
what was going on, but knew that they didn’t want Jones back.
○ Obedient - Squealer knows that the best way he could’ve stayed happy and well treated
on the farm was to make himself completely obedient to Napoleon. All the way to the
ends of the book, Squealer made sure that he was in constant support of Napoleon, and
did all the brainwashing by himself. This is what let him stay so close to Napoleon
throughout.

○ Mr. Frederick - The owner of Pinchfield farm, one of the neighbors of Animal Farm, Mr.
Frederick is an enemy of Pilkington and a hypocrite towards Mr. Jones, saying that he
feels sympathy for his farm being overthrown but at the same time attempts to make a
profit off it, and once attempts to take control by force.
○ Deceitful - Mr. Frederick is defined by his deceitful and dishonestness. For example, he
is seen using counterfeit money to buy Napoleon’s timber.
 ○ Selfish - Mr. Frederick is consistently putting himself first; he takes whatever he wants,
and will attempt to force it if the others do not comply. He is motivated purely by his own
greed.

○ Mollie - Mollie is an empty headed, self obsessed mare, more concerned with her own
appearance than the welfare and happiness of her fellow animals. She values material
things above even her own freedom, and doesn’t care about the rebellion or the values
behind it. She ends up leaving the farm to join Pilkington, who would feed her sugar and
give her ribbons.
○ Vain - Mollie is infamous around the barn for her love of herself and her looks. When all
of the animals enter the Jones’ house, they were all careful not to touch anything or
interact with the human artifacts; Mollie, however, instantly found a blue ribbon in the
area and admired herself in the mirror. When she finally leaves the farm, she is seen with
a brand new scarlet ribbon around her neck, displaying what she takes as more important.
○ Shallow - Mollie seems to be lacking many morals. From the beginning, in the rebellion,
Mollie went off to hide as soon as weapons were drawn, unlike every other animal. She
didn’t seem to care much about winning the rebellion either, and never helped out with
work around the farm; she was focused on herself and only herself.

● Minor:

○ Mr. Whymper - Mr Whymper is a lawyer who negotiates between Animal Farm and it’s
neighboring farms. He works for the pig Napoleon.
○ Gullible - Napoleon is easily able to convince Whymper that Animal Farm is doing fine
by, for example, filling empty grain bins with sand.
○ Opportunistic - Whymper is willing to “lower himself” to work with and for the
animals, in hopes of making money off of Animal Farm, despite the animals often being
shunned by other humans.

○ Mrs. Jones - Mrs. Jones is the wife of Mr. Jones, who seems quite content with life even
though her husband is a drunkard.
○ Passive - Mrs. Jones seems to tolerate her husbands drunkenness and laziness, and does
nothing to stand up to his behavior.
○ Cowardly - After the animals rebel, Mrs. Jones instantly throws all her stuff into a bag
and runs, without making any attempt to defend her husband or her home.

○ Clover - The other kind horse on the farm, Clover is the one who attempts to help out
Boxer once he collapses from exhaustion.
 ○ Maternal - Clover warns Boxer not to overexert himself when building the windmill and
frequently shows concern for him. She also screams out to him to escape when she
realizes he’s being sent to the glue factory.
○ Observant - Unlike Boxer, Clover notices some of Napoleon’s bad decisions and
questions them more than the other animals do.

○ Bluebell, Jessie, and Pincher - Jones’ dogs. Jessie and Bluebell are the parents of the
pups who end up growing into Napoleon’s guard dogs.
○ Intelligent - The dogs are easily able to read.
○ Unimaginative - The dogs are completely happy just reading the Seven Commandments
and following their masters.

● 5) Plot Outline: Old Major, in his last days before his death, gathers all the animals on the Manor
Farm and gives them a rousing speech, telling them of a revolution in a distant future, and that
they must all keep hope. This revolution ends up coming sooner than was expected; led by
Snowball and Napoleon soon after Old Major’s death, the animals run the owner, Mr. Jones, out
of the farm and rename it Animal Farm. They write up Seven Commandments to live by, and
begin their working lives as working for themselves. Their lives are happy (They manage to
defeat Jones again when he tries to retake the farm), but their two leaders, Snowball and
Napoleon, constantly argue with each other. This is ‘fixed’ when Napoleon forcefully runs
Snowball out of the farm with his new guard dogs. Napoleon then takes credit for one of
Snowball’s ideas, the Windmill, and puts the animals back to work. The next year is full of hard
work; Jones gives up on retaking the farm, Napoleon begins associating with a few humans, and
the windmill topples (Which Napoleon, of course, blames on Snowball). Napoleon becomes a
much stricter dictator, treating the animals worse and worse and the pigs better and better. Boxer,
one of the hardest working horses collapses and is sent off to the glue factory; this is basically the
line where the farm becomes a living hell. Many years pass, as the pigs become more and more
human, and the book ends with pigs looking at humans and vica versa, with neither being able to
tell which is which.

6) Major Themes of the Work:

○ Corrupt Government:
■ From the start, the Pigs take all that they want to live much nicer than the other
animals.
■ The tyranny of the Pigs is ironic, for they have become exactly what they
overthrew (Humans)
■ Just like other corrupt governments, the pigs would get rid of those that could
sabotage them (For example, Napoleon running out Snowball)
● George Orwell makes a point throughout the book that we seem to be
unable to annihilate corruption no matter how hard we try; No matter
what, someone out there will thirst for power.
 ● Orwell obviously made the rules Pigs because the term Pig can also be
used as an insult, meaning someone gluttonous and selfish (Which also
describes what the Pigs/Government are
○ Gullible and Agreeable Populations:
■ Some people are purely obsessed with material value (Mollie, for example) and
are fine with letting the tyranny of the Pigs happen
■ Other animals are much to gullible and obedient to understand what’s going on;
Animals like Boxer and the dogs on the farm will just follow whoever leads them
thoughtlessly.
● Orwell makes the point that the Pigs are not the only ones to blame in
this. The animals (aka. The Population) just willingly go along with
everything happening, either because they don’t care enough to stop it or
because they’re too gullible to understand.
● This can also be seen as Orwell purposefully reaching out to the reader to
not be like this. Orwell is basically telling the reader to make sure to not
make the same mistakes the animals did, unless we wish to end up like
them.
○ Betrayal:
■ The alliances made between both Pilkington and Frederick both held elements of
betrayal; Frederick gave the pigs fake money, and Pilkington would continuously
try to cheat the Farm.
■ The Pigs are seen to begin betraying the Seven Commandments from very early
in the book, and continue to do so until the very end.
● Orwell makes a good point in this, which is that no government or person
is completely trustworthy. Almost everyone in Animal Farm betrays
something of their own throughout the course of the book, as most
people do in life.
7) Symbols in the book:
○ The Seven Commandments:
■ The Seven Commandments, painted on the side of the barn, and the way the Pigs
alter them over the course of the book represents how a new government is able
to manipulate and alter the view of history of their subjects. The first example of
this is on page 67, where “Clover had not remembered that the Fourth
Commandment had mentioned sheets; but as it was there on the wall, it must be
so.” The pigs, taking advantage of their higher intelligence, would alter the
commandments to their needs, for those animals lesser than them would
automatically accept what was written. This would end with “All Animals are
equal, but some Animals are more equal than others” being the only rule left on
the board, on page 134.
○ The Windmill:
■ The windmill is a symbol of how those in power (The Pigs) can strengthen their
on their land and people by manipulating them into doing work for their leaders.
The animals on the farm are promised that the windmill shall provide for them in
the future, but in reality, this windmill would only ever benefit those in power.
 When the windmill is first presented by Snowball, on page 52 in chapter 5, it
seemed like a great idea, and everyone agreed on it: “By the time he had finished
speaking, there was no doubt as to which way the vote would go.” However, by
Napoleon’s manipulations, the windmill became nothing more than a constant
distraction, never to be completed.

8) Other Significant Imagery (Horn and Hoof, The Barn, Major’s Dream)
● The Barn:
○ “The Rebellion had been successfully carried through: Jones was expelled, and
the manor farm was theirs.” Page 20, Chapter 2. The barn can basically be seen
as representing a country. Usually ruled by one tyrant or another, the barn has its
own laws and social organizations, just like any other country. Jones can be seen
as the original ruler of the farm; after the rebellion, the pigs take his place.
● Horn and Hoof:
○ “While the hoof and horn signified the future Republic of the Animals which
would arise when the human race had finally been overthrown.” Page 31,
Chapter 3. The Horn and Hoof are very similar to the Communist Hammer and
Sickle, which represented unification and rebellion. The Horn and Hoof is also
quite an ironic flag; The flag is colored green to represent peace and happiness
across the farm, and yet the farm ends up becoming a living hell.
● Major’s Dream
○ “And now, comrades, I will tell you about my dream of last night.” Page 11,
Chapter 1. Old Major’s dream is the idea that first kickstarts the revolution, but
which could never be upheld. His dream, a dream of equality and happiness,
sounded perfect to the animals; but of course, Major’s dream was naive, for he
should’ve realized that some animals would always hold onto power.

● 9) Significance of the Title, Animal Farm:

○ The original meaning of the name Animal Farm in the book, of course, was to show that
the animals had taken control of the farm. After taking over the Farm (originally named
Manor Farm) in the rebellion, the animals decided on this new name as a symbol of their
success, and of finally achieving freedom. However, over the course of the book, this
entire idea of ‘success’ is lessened more and more as the pigs, led by Napoleon, become
more and more human, betraying the fundamental rules of Animalism that were founded
long ago. As this happens, the name becomes more and more ironic; Even though it’s
called Animal Farm, the pig leaders of the farm have basically become humans by the
end, as stated in the last line of the book: “The creatures outside looked from pig to man,
and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but it was already impossible to say
which was which.”
○ One of the author’s purposes in choosing this title was to critique not only Soviet Russia
and the communist party generally, but also human society and government in general.
The ‘farm’ and neighboring ‘farms’ can be seen to represent different states, and the
diplomacy and double dealing that goes on between them. This title resonates with issues
of class and rank, as does the farm itself with the pigs acting as dictators (and in some
 cases as police, and ‘pigs’ in that disparaging sense, and the rest of the animals as the
working class beneath them. With the title ‘Animal Farm’ George Orwell shows that the
so called differences between classes, and between humans and animals, are in many
ways arbitrary.

● 10) Author’s Techniques that are important to the work:

The techniques important to this work include satire, personification and symbolism.
○ Satire:
■ George Orwell was a lover of other satirical books, and Animal Farm is his own
rendition of one. One of the main things Orwell satirizes in Animal Farm is the
leaders of the world, with their hypocrisy, lies and never ending corruption.
Orwell displays these dictators as making a case that all the horrible torture they
inflict on others is for their own good, and that anything the animals believe
could be wrong if Napoleon said so. The best example of this is running
Snowball of the farm; on chapter 5 page 55, Squealer describes Snowball as
“Who, as we now know, is no better than a criminal?” Without any evidence to
support him, but the animals still go along believing.
○ Personification: (And animalisation)
■ In Animal Farm, Orwell uses personification of animals both generally, such as
by making the ‘pigs’ into the leaders (knowing that calling someone a pig means
they are selfish and gluttonous); and with regard to specific individuals and
characters. Old Major, for example, is intended to be the animal version of
Lenin, the Russian communist leader, just as Trotsky is represented by Snowball.
Their leadership is established all the way back at the start of the book, from page
27-28: “The pigs did not actually work, but directed and supervised the others.
With their superior knowledge it was natural that they should assume the
leadership.”
○ Symbolism:
■ Orwell further uses the technique of symbolism to draw parallels between the
soviet Russia he is trying to satirize, and the animals and humans of Animal
Farm. Many of the animals on the farm are quite obviously shown to represent
major figures in the Russian Revolution, which is shown in the previous
paragraph. The horn and the hoof are made to symbolize the Soviet Hammer and
Sickle, on page 31, chapter 3: “While the hoof and horn signified the future
Republic of the Animals which would arise when the human race had finally
been overthrown.” These symbols are outlined in more detail below.