ILIT 1200: Introduction to Literature

Lecture notes prepared by Dr Witness Mdoka

Animal Farm by George Orwell

Summary
Manor Farm is a small farm in England run by the harsh and often drunk Mr. Jones.
One night, a boar named Old Major gathers all the animals of Manor Farm together.
Knowing that he will soon die, Old Major gives a speech in which he reveals to the
animals that men cause all the misery that animals endure. Old Major says that all
animals are equal and urges them to join together to rebel. He teaches them a
revolutionary song called “Beasts of England.” Old Major dies soon after, but two pigs
named Snowball and Napoleon adapt his ideas into the philosophy of Animalism. They
set about trying to spread Animalism’s ideals to the other animals on the farm, but this
proves to be an uphill battle. The carthorses, Boxer and Clover, prove to be their best
disciples, as they are able to distill Animalism into simple arguments and share them
with the other animals.

Three months later, Mr. Jones neglects to feed his animals for more than twenty-four
hours. The animals revolt and chase Mr. Jones and the farmhands off of the farm in
what ends up being an easy victory. The animals promptly burn all items that allowed
Mr. Jones to maintain power, such as whips, bits, and knives. The next morning, the
animals tour the farm and the pigs reveal that over the last few months, they’ve taught
themselves to read. Snowball is the best at writing, and with white paint he amends the
farm’s gate to read “Animal Farm.” At the big barn, Snowball also writes the tenets of
Animalism, which he and Napoleon distilled into Seven Commandments. The
commandments state that all animals are equal, and no animal may act like a human
by sleeping in a bed, walking on two legs, killing other animals, or drinking alcohol.
They state that humans are the only enemy. The animals turn to the hay harvest after
the pigs figure out how to milk the cows, but the milk begins to disappear.

The absence of humans means that the animals are far more successful than Mr. Jones
ever was. There is enough food, and the animals take pride in being able to feed
themselves with their own labor. The pigs are clever enough to figure out how to

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perform certain tasks without standing on two legs, while Boxer seems as strong as
three horses and adopts the motto “I will work harder!” All the animals throw
themselves into the running of the farm except for the vain horse Mollie, who makes
lots of excuses as to why she cannot work. Benjamin the donkey seems not to care
about anything and cryptically tells everyone that donkeys live a long time.

Snowball organizes committees for the animals – which are mostly unsuccessful – and
more successfully teaches animals to read. The dogs, the pigs, the goat Muriel, and
Benjamin are the only ones who become fully literate. Less intelligent animals, such as
the sheep, only learn the letter A and cannot remember the Seven Commandments, so
Snowball distills this down into the maxim “Four legs good, two legs bad.” He has to
explain to the birds why this is acceptable, since they have only two legs. Napoleon,
meanwhile, takes the nine new puppies to train, insisting it’s more useful to focus on
educating the young. A fight for power soon develops between Snowball and
Napoleon.

Snowball and Napoleon send out pigeons to neighboring farms to spread the word to
other animals. The other farmers sympathize with Mr. Jones, but only want to make
the situation work for them. Fortunately for the animals, their neighbors, Mr.
Pilkington of Foxwood Farm and Mr. Frederick of Pinchfield Farm, hate each other,
though they’re both terrified of what happened at Animal Farm. In October, Mr. Jones
and some men invade the farm with a gun. The animals fight bravely and send the men
racing away, though Boxer is distraught when he believes he killed a stable boy.
Snowball gives a speech about the importance of dying for Animal Farm and they agree
to fire Mr. Jones’s gun twice per year, on the anniversaries of the rebellion and of the
Battle of the Cowshed. They also come up with military honors and confer one on
Snowball.

In the winter, Mollie disappears to serve a man in town. The pigs argue over how to
plan the coming season and the rivalry between Snowball and Napoleon comes to a
head over Snowball's idea to build a windmill. Snowball convinces animals by insisting
that a windmill would give them electricity and ensure they only have to work three

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days per week, while Napoleon quietly insists this is nonsense. At the final debate about
the windmill, Napoleon summons the puppies, whom he secretly reared to be his own
vicious servants, and has them chase Snowball from Animal Farm. Napoleon tells the
other animals that Snowball was a “bad influence,” eliminates the animals’ right to vote,
and takes “the burden” of leadership on himself. He sends around a pig
named Squealer, who persuades the animals that Napoleon has their best interests at
heart.

Three weeks later Napoleon decides they should build the windmill after all—the
windmill, he insists, was his idea to begin with, but Snowball stole his plans. The animals
set to work, with Boxer leading. Focusing on the windmill reduces the productivity of
the farm, and all the animals but the pigs and the dogs get less to eat. Napoleon
institutes work on Sundays that’s voluntary, but animals who don’t work will receive
reduced rations. The pigs engage a solicitor named Mr. Whymper to represent them
and begin to trade with other farms. They move into Mr. Jones's farmhouse and start
to sleep in beds. This confuses Clover, who thought this was forbidden. When she asks
Muriel to read her the Commandment about beds, it reads: “No animal shall sleep in a
bed with sheets.” Squealer, accompanied by dogs, insists that if the pigs don’t get
enough sleep, Mr. Jones will return.

That winter, a storm destroys the partially complete windmill. Napoleon blames the
catastrophe on the “traitor” Snowball and insists that Snowball is hiding out at
Foxwood. Humans insist that the windmill fell because of the weather and though the
animals do not believe it, they build the walls of the second windmill twice as thick.
Napoleon covers up that the farm does not have enough food, and in January, tells
the hens that he’s agreed to trade 400 eggs per week for grain. The hens are distraught,
as they’d all planned on hatching spring chicks, so they revolt and sacrifice their eggs.
Napoleon cuts their rations and the hens give up after five days, after nine hens die.
Napoleon circulates that they died of disease and catches wind that Snowball is sneaking
onto Animal Farm and causing mischief, such as trampling eggs and stealing. One
evening, Squealer insists that Snowball is in league with Mr. Frederick and has been on
Mr. Jones’s side the whole time. Boxer is dumbfounded and notes that Snowball fought

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with them, but Squealer insists that according to Napoleon, Snowball is on Mr. Jones’s
side.

Four days later, Napoleon sets his dogs on four young pigs and Boxer during a meeting.
Boxer paws the dogs away, but the dogs rip the pigs’ throats out after they confess to
conspiring with Snowball. Other animals confess heinous crimes as well, and the dogs
kill all of them. The remaining animals gather at the windmill, and Boxer suggests that
this happened because they’ve done something wrong. Clover cannot formulate her
thoughts into words, but she thinks that this wasn’t what she had in mind when she
joined the rebellion. However, she still thinks that this is better than living under Mr.
Jones and vows to accept Napoleon’s leadership. She leads the animals in a round of
“Beasts of England,” but Squealer stops by and announces that the song is now banned:
the revolution it speaks of has happened, so it is no longer useful. Minimus the pig
composes a new song that none of the animals like as much. A few days after the
massacre, Clover remembers that the Seven Commandments stated that animals should
not kill each other, but when she asks Muriel to read the Commandments on the barn,
the Commandment reads that animals can’t kill each other without cause.

The animals work harder than ever, and Squealer regularly reads them figures that show
the farm’s productivity is up by 200 to 500 percent. Napoleon stays inside the
farmhouse most of the time, guarded by the dogs. When Minimus composes a poem
in Napoleon’s honor, Napoleon has it written on the barn next to the Commandments
and a portrait of himself. Napoleon negotiates with Mr. Frederick and Mr. Pilkington
about timber on the property he’d like to sell, and tensions run high. They finish the
windmill in the fall and soon after, Napoleon announces he sold the timber to Mr.
Frederick after promising it to Mr. Pilkington. The money will buy the animals the
machinery for the windmill. Mr. Whymper, however, reveals that Mr. Frederick paid
for the timber with forged banknotes. Mr. Frederick and his men, many with guns,
invade Animal Farm and blow up the windmill. The enraged animals chase them away
but feel discouraged until Squealer points out that they achieved a great victory. The
pigs discover a case of whiskey and after initially announcing that Napoleon is dying,
they declare that all spare fields will be planted with barley. All of it will go to the pigs.

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One night, animals hear a crash and find Squealer next to the barn with a broken ladder
and paint. The next morning, the Commandments read that animals shouldn’t drink to
excess.

As Boxer approaches retirement, he refuses to take time to let his injuries heal. He wants
to see the windmill done. When 31 piglets, all Napoleon’s children, are born in the
spring, Napoleon announces that they need to build a schoolhouse and institutes a rule
that all other animals must let pigs pass. Napoleon is unanimously voted to be the
farm’s president when it becomes a republic. In the summer, Boxer collapses while
working on the windmill, and Napoleon announces that a human vet will treat him.
When the van comes to collect Boxer, however, Benjamin rouses everyone: the van
reads that Boxer is going to the glue factory. They never see Boxer again, and Squealer
insists that the van was recently purchased by a vet and hadn’t yet been repainted. The
pigs come up with money to buy more whiskey a few days later.

Years pass. Now only a few of the remaining animals on the farm experienced the
revolution. Even fewer remember its goals. They complete the first windmill and begin
a second, but neither windmill will electrify the farm. The pigs teach themselves to walk
on two legs, begin carrying whips, and teach the sheep to bleat “Four legs good, two
legs better.” When Clover and Benjamin check the Seven Commandments, they only
see the statement: "All animals are equal. But some animals are more equal than others."
The pigs make peace with their human neighbors and have a feast, but both Napoleon
and Mr. Pilkington cheat at cards and begin a fight. The other animals are shocked to
discover that they can no longer tell the pigs from the humans.

Character Analysis

Napoleon
The primary antagonist of the novel; a pig who is one of Old Major’s disciples, along
with Snowball. At first, Napoleon and Snowball work together to develop the ideology
of Animalism and spread its ideals throughout all the animals on the farm, but
Napoleon proves to have very different goals than Snowball. Where Snowball is

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relatively idealistic and wants to help others, Napoleon soon proves himself cruel and
power hungry. When the conflict comes to a head over whether or not to build
a windmill, Napoleon reveals that he’s trained nine dogs to be his secret police force,
chases Snowball off the farm, and institutes a totalitarian state at Animal Farm. He
maintains his rule by demanding unwavering loyalty and trust from his subjects, and he
achieves at least outward displays of trust through intimidation and the spread of
misinformation through propaganda. Napoleon is often the one to make grand,
sinister-sounding pronouncements, but then always sends the pig Squealer around to
convince everyone that Napoleon is actually acting in their best interests – and never
in his own self-interest. He’s especially interested in developing an educated ruling class,
which he does by educating the dogs, and later by insisting on educating the 31 piglets
he fathers in a special schoolhouse. Throughout the novel, Napoleon proves himself to
be paranoid, self-important, and unable to accept that he’s wrong – he blames all
manner of horrible things on either Snowball or the neighboring farmers. By the end of
the novel, Napoleon is undistinguishable from the humans he has denounced along: he
is fat, powerful, and begins to walk on two legs, wear clothes, and carry a whip. In
Napoleon’s eyes, it’s a good thing that the other animals are so hungry and powerless,
and he insists that this state of affairs is called for in Animalism. He ultimately changes
Animal Farm’s name back to Manor Farm in a bid to make it seem more palatable to
the farmers, and he proves himself to be just as corrupt as his human
counterparts. Napoleon symbolizes Stalin, who led the Soviet Union from 1930 until
his death in 1953.

Snowball

At first, a friend and companion of Napoleon’s. Together, Snowball and Napoleon

develop the theory of Animalism from the ideas of Old Major’s speech, and later they
distill these ideas down into the Seven Commandments. Snowball is responsible for
generating the maxim “four legs good, two legs bad,” which he teaches to the sheep and
other less intelligent animals in order to give them some version of the Seven
Commandments to repeat. Despite being the generator of this maxim, in the months

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after, the phrase often gets used against Snowball during Sunday meetings, as the sheep
often start bleating the maxim out of the blue during Snowball’s speeches. It’s implied
that these interruptions are Napoleon’s work, as the two pigs develop an intense rivalry
in the months after the rebellion. Snowball is somewhat of an idealistic individual; he
proposes that the farm animals build a windmill in order to generate electricity, which
he suggests will ultimately lead to a three-day workweek. He also comes up with a
variety of other schemes and groups aimed at improving the animals’ lives and
education status, and he also promotes spreading news of the rebellion far and wide.
Despite his idealism, however, Snowball still shows himself to be willing to exploit the
other animals for his own gain, as when he says nothing about taking the milk and
apples for the pigs only. On the day that the animals vote to build the windmill,
Napoleon exiles Snowball by setting his attack dogs on him. After this, Snowball
disappears as a character, but Napoleon continues to invoke Snowball as a nefarious
figure who conspires against Animal Farm, is in league with humans, and is intent on
messing everything up on the farm. Through this, Napoleon discredits Snowball’s
bravery and actions in the Battle of the Cowshed and makes it so no animal can feel
any affinity for Snowball. Snowball symbolizes Trotsky, a rival of Stalin exiled from
Russia and assassinated on Stalin’s orders in Mexico in 1940.

Boxer

A huge, gentle carthorse. Boxer is not especially intelligent – he only learns the first four
letters of the alphabet – but Old Major’s speech and the equality expressed in the Seven
Commandments appeals to his generous nature. Because of this, Boxer becomes one
of Napoleon and Snowball’s biggest disciples as they attempt to spread the ideals of
Animalism to others, as Boxer is capable of making simple, easy to understand
arguments to his peers. After the rebellion, Boxer then becomes one of the most
valuable members of Animal Farm, as he’s fully sold on its ideals, entirely loyal to
Napoleon, and convinced that his hard work is absolutely essential to the success of the
farm. On that final point, Boxer is right: his labor is what makes it so that the animals

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are able to build both attempts at their windmills. To this end, Boxer adopts two
personal mottos: “I will work harder,” and “Napoleon is always right.” Through these
mottos, the novel shows how someone like Boxer sacrifices himself to the cause at the
expense of everything, including his health, his intellect, and his possibility for
advancement. Boxer never realizes that Napoleon is the reason conditions are so poor
on Animal Farm, and he never becomes aware of his own strength or power to change
anything. This means that when Boxer collapses, he fully believes that Napoleon is
going to send him to a human veterinarian – and he can not read the writing on the
van that comes to take him away, which is a van bound for a glue factory. By the time
other animals alert Boxer to what’s going on, Boxer is far too weak to make any
successful attempt to save himself, and instead, his death goes on to benefit the ruling
class of pigs on Animal Farm. Boxer represents the male working class and peasants of
the Soviet Union.

Benjamin

A jaded donkey with the skeptical view that life will always be difficult and painful.
Because of this outlook, Benjamin isn’t surprised when the pigs corrupt the revolution
and transform Animal Farm into a totalitarian state. Though his skepticism proves to be
well-founded and he alone among the animals seems aware of what’s going on, it also
renders him ineffective as he’s unwilling to speak up or do anything to stop it. He also
consistently refuses to explain what’s going on to his friends, as when he refuses to read
the Seven Commandments to Clover and alone understands what he’s seeing when the
animals find Squealer and paint next to a broken ladder and the Seven Commandments.
This comes back to haunt him when Napoleon betrays Boxer and sends him to the glue
factory—though Benjamin does speak up and tell the animals what’s going on, it’s too
late to save Boxer. Benjamin represents those who were aware of Stalin’s unjust and
oppressive policies but did nothing to try to stop them.

Squealer

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A fat pig who’s a skilled orator. Squealer works closely with Snowball and Napoleon at
first – and later, just Napoleon – to interpret or distill what the pigs’ plan is for the
other animals. Squealer is purportedly able to convince animals of anything, and he’s
very effective in his job. Sometimes he’s effective because of the way he’s able to
manipulate language; other times, Squealer is effective because the
attack dogs accompany him. He benefits from Napoleon’s rule, as Squealer is often
tasked with addressing the animals during Sunday meetings and gets the same extensive
rations as the rest of the pigs. At the end of the novel, Squealer learns to walk on two
legs and teaches the sheep the new maxim “Four legs good, two legs better!” He’s
present at the meeting between the pigs and the farmers. Squealer represents the Soviet
press, which Stalin controlled throughout his rule.

Old Major

A revered old boar who, at the beginning of the novel, gathers the animals together to
speak to them about what’s wrong with their world. He proposes that humanity is their
one true enemy, as people profit off of what animals produce without producing
anything themselves – and specifically in the case of Mr. Jones, humans are cruel,
unfeeling, and abuse those below them. Old Major’s speech forms the basis for
Animalism, a theory that Napoleon and Snowball develop in the three months after
Old Major’s death. Old Major dies a few months before the revolution and so never
gets to see his ideas play out in the real world, but Napoleon does eventually disinter
Old Major’s head so that the other animals can walk past it reverently. Old
Major symbolizes both Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin, the fathers of Communism.

Clover

A gentle, motherly, and powerful carthorse. She supports the revolution, as she
naturally takes it upon herself to protect those weaker than she is, and she recognizes
this kind of communal spirit echoed in the Seven Commandments. When Animal Farm
begins to descend into a totalitarian state under Napoleon, however, Clover becomes
dismayed – but she does not have the will, personality, or education to resist the pigs.

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Clover never becomes fully literate and only learns the alphabet, and so she’s unable
to detect changes to the Seven Commandments and buys into everything the pigs say.
In this sense, she becomes a witness to the corruption, though she only vaguely
understands that something went wrong – but still believes that the totalitarian state
she finds herself living in must be better than life under Mr. Jones. Clover symbolizes
the female working class and peasants of the Soviet Union.

Mr. Jones

The original owner of Manor Farm. Once a strict and fierce master, in the years before
the story begins, Mr. Jones became drunk, careless, and ineffective, as well as casually
cruel and arrogant. Mr. Jones’s carelessness and cruelty are the final straw for the
animals: they instigate a rebellion when he neglects to feed them and then tries to beat
them when they break into the stores of grain. Though Mr. Jones attempts to take back
Animal Farm, his attempt is unsuccessful and none of the other farmers have much
genuine sympathy for him. Mr. Jones symbolizes the Russian Tsar in the early 20th
century.

Mr. Pilkington

The gentleman farmer who owns Foxwood, one of Animal Farm’s neighbours.
Foxwood is large, sprawling, and old-fashioned, and Mr. Pilkington himself spends
more time hunting and on leisure activities than he does farming.
Though Napoleon vilifies Mr. Pilkington at various times, Mr. Pilkington does appear
to enter into an agreement to buy timber from Animal Farm in good faith – but he
rudely pulls his support for Animal Farm when Napoleon double-crosses him. Mr.
Pilkington attends the final card game at Animal Farm and tries to cheat Napoleon. Mr.
Pilkington represents the Allies before World War II.

Symbol Analysis

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 The Windmill

The windmill represents the massive infrastructure construction projects and

modernization initiatives that Soviet leaders instituted immediately after the Russian
Revolution, specifically Joseph Stalin’s Five-Year Plans. The way that the animals go
hungry in order to build the windmill in the first place mirrors how the Five Year Plans,
while intended to create enough food for everyone, were wildly unsuccessful and led
to widespread famine in the early 1930s. Later in the novel, the windmill also comes to
symbolize the pigs’ totalitarian triumph: the other animals work to build the windmill
thinking it will benefit everyone, but even after it benefits only the pigs, the animals
continue to believe that it benefits all of them.

Character Names

As Orwell wrote Animal Farm as an allegory – a symbolic representation of real events

– many characters and events in the novel symbolize individuals or groups in the Russian
Revolution and the Soviet Union. Some of the characters who symbolize individuals or
groups in Soviet society include Mr. Jones (the Russian Tsar and the old aristocratic
order); Old Major (Karl Marx and Vladimir
Lenin); Napoleon (Stalin); Snowball (Trotsky); Squealer (the press); the dogs (the secret
police); and Moses the Raven (organized religion). Nearly all of the other animals
represent the working class and Soviet peasants.

The Corruption of Socialist Ideals in the Soviet Union

Animal Farm is most famous in the West as a stinging critique of the history and rhetoric
of the Russian Revolution. Retelling the story of the emergence and development of
Soviet communism in the form of an animal fable, Animal Farm allegorizes the rise to
power of the dictator Joseph Stalin. In the novella, the overthrow of the human

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oppressor Mr. Jones by a democratic coalition of animals quickly gives way to the
consolidation of power among the pigs. Much like the Soviet intelligentsia, the pigs
establish themselves as the ruling class in the new society.

The struggle for preeminence between Leon Trotsky and Stalin emerges in the rivalry
between the pigs Snowball and Napoleon. In both the historical and fictional cases, the
idealistic but politically less powerful figure (Trotsky and Snowball) is expelled from the
revolutionary state by the malicious and violent usurper of powe’ (Stalin and
Napoleon). The purges and show trials with which Stalin eliminated his enemies and
solidified his political base find expression in Animal Farm as the false confessions and
executions of animals whom Napoleon distrusts following the collapse of the windmill.
Stalin’s tyrannical rule and eventual abandonment of the founding principles of the
Russian Revolution are represented by the pigs’ turn to violent government and the
adoption of human traits and behaviors, the trappings of their original oppressors.

Although Orwell believed strongly in socialist ideals, he felt that the Soviet Union
realized these ideals in a terribly perverse form. His novella creates its most powerful
ironies in the moments in which Orwell depicts the corruption of Animalist ideals by
those in power. For Animal Farm serves not so much to condemn tyranny or despotism
as to indict the horrifying hypocrisy of tyrannies that base themselves on, and owe their
initial power to, ideologies of liberation and equality. The gradual disintegration and
perversion of the Seven Commandments illustrates this hypocrisy with vivid force, as
do Squealer’s elaborate philosophical justifications for the pigs’ blatantly unprincipled
actions. Thus, the novella critiques the violence of the Stalinist regime against the human
beings it ruled, and also points to Soviet communism’s violence against human logic,
language, and ideals.
The Societal tendency toward Class Stratification
Animal Farm offers commentary on the development of class tyranny and the human
tendency to maintain and reestablish class structures even in societies that allegedly
stand for total equality. The novella illustrates how classes that are initially unified in
the face of a common enemy, as the animals are against the humans, may become
internally divided when that enemy is eliminated. The expulsion of Mr. Jones creates a

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power vacuum, and it is only so long before the next oppressor assumes totalitarian
control.

The natural division between intellectual and physical labor quickly comes to express
itself as a new set of class divisions, with the “brainworkers” (as the pigs claim to be)
using their superior intelligence to manipulate society to their own benefit. Orwell
never clarifies in Animal Farm whether this negative state of affairs constitutes an
inherent aspect of society or merely an outcome contingent on the integrity of a
society’s intelligentsia. In either case, the novella points to the force of this tendency
toward class stratification in many communities and the threat that it poses to
democracy and freedom.

The danger of a Naïve Working Class

One of the novella’s most impressive accomplishments is its portrayal not just of the
figures in power but also of the oppressed people themselves. Animal Farm is not told
from the perspective of any particular character, though occasionally it does slip into
Clover’s consciousness. Rather, the story is told from the perspective of the common
animals as a whole. Gullible, loyal, and hardworking, these animals give Orwell a
chance to sketch how situations of oppression arise not only from the motives and
tactics of the oppressors but also from the naïveté of the oppressed, who are not
necessarily in a position to be better educated or informed. When presented with a
dilemma, Boxer prefers not to puzzle out the implications of various possible actions
but instead to repeat to himself, “Napoleon is always right.” Animal Farm demonstrates
how the inability or unwillingness to question authority condemns the working class to
suffer the full extent of the ruling class’s oppression.

The abuse of language as instrumental to the abuse of power

One of Orwell’s central concerns, both in Animal Farm and in 1984, is the way in which
language can be manipulated as an instrument of control. In Animal Farm, the pigs
gradually twist and distort a rhetoric of socialist revolution to justify their behavior and
to keep the other animals in the dark. The animals heartily embrace Major’s visionary
ideal of socialism, but after Major dies, the pigs gradually twist the meaning of his

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words. As a result, the other animals seem unable to oppose the pigs without also
opposing the ideals of the Rebellion.
By the end of the novella, after Squealer’s repeated reconfigurations of the Seven
Commandments in order to decriminalize the pigs’ treacheries, the main principle of
the farm can be openly stated as “all animals are equal, but some animals are more
equal than others.” This outrageous abuse of the word “equal” and of the ideal of
equality in general typifies the pigs’ method, which becomes increasingly audacious as
the novel progresses. Orwell’s sophisticated exposure of this abuse of language remains
one of the most compelling and enduring features of Animal Farm, worthy of close
study even after we have decoded its allegorical characters and events.

Corruption
Animal Farm demonstrates the idea that power always corrupts. The novella’s heavy
use of foreshadowing, especially in the opening chapter, creates the sense that the
events of the story are unavoidable. Not only is Napoleon’s rise to power inevitable,
the novella strongly suggests that any other possible ruler would have been just as bad
as Napoleon. Although Napoleon is more power-hungry than Snowball, plenty of
evidence exists to suggest that Snowball would have been just as corrupt a ruler. Before
his expulsion, Snowball goes along with the pigs’ theft of milk and apples, and the
disastrous windmill is his idea. Even Old Major is not incorruptible. Despite his belief
that “all animals are equal,” (Chapter 1) he lectures the other animals from a raised
platform, suggesting he may actually view himself as above the other animals on the
farm. In the novel’s final image the pigs become indistinguishable from human farmers,
which hammers home the idea that power inevitably has the same effect on anyone
who wields it.

The failure of intellect

Animal Farm is deeply skeptical about the value of intellectual activity. The pigs are
identified as the most intelligent animals, but their intelligence rarely produces anything
of value. Instead, the pigs use their intelligence to manipulate and abuse the other
animals. The novella identifies several other ways in which intelligence fails to be useful
or good. Benjamin is literate, but he refuses to read, suggesting that intelligence is

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worthless without the moral sense to engage in politics and the courage to act. The
dogs are nearly as literate as the pigs, but they are “not interested in reading anything
except the Seven Commandments” (Chapter 3). The dogs’ use of their intelligence
suggests that intellect is useless – even harmful – when it is combined with a personality
that prefers to obey orders rather than question them.
The exploitation of animals by humans
As well as being an allegory of the ways human exploit and oppress one
another, Animal Farm also makes a more literal argument: humans exploit and oppress
animals. While the animals’ rebellion is mostly comic in tone, it ends on a serious and
touching note, when the animals “wipe out the last traces of Jones’s hated reign. The
harness-room at the end of the stables was broken open; the bits, the nose-rings, the
dog-chains, the cruel knives with which Mr. Jones had been used to castrate the pigs
and lambs, were all flung down the well” (Chapter 2). The novella also suggests that
there is a real connection, as well as an allegorical one, between the exploitation of
animals and the exploitation of human workers. Mr. Pilkington jokes to Napoleon: “If
you have your lower animals to contend with […] we have our lower classes!” (Chapter
10). From the point of view of the ruling class, animals and workers are the same.

Songs
Animal Farm is filled with songs, poems, and slogans, including Major’s stirring “Beasts
of England,” Minimus’s ode to Napoleon, the sheep’s chants, and Minimus’s revised
anthem, “Animal Farm, Animal Farm.” All of these songs serve as propaganda, one of
the major conduits of social control. By making the working-class animals speak the
same words at the same time, the pigs evoke an atmosphere of grandeur and nobility
associated with the recited text’s subject matter. The songs also erode the animals’ sense
of individuality and keep them focused on the tasks by which they will purportedly
achieve freedom.

State Ritual
As Animal Farm shifts gears from its early revolutionary fervor to a phase of
consolidation of power in the hands of the few, national rituals become an ever more
common part of the farm’s social life. Military awards, large parades, and new songs

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all proliferate as the state attempts to reinforce the loyalty of the animals. The increasing
frequency of the rituals bespeaks the extent to which the working class in the novella
becomes ever more reliant on the ruling class to define their group identity and values.

Animal Farm
Animal Farm, known at the beginning and the end of the novel as the Manor Farm,
symbolizes Russia and the Soviet Union under Communist Party rule. But more
generally, Animal Farm stands for any human society, be it capitalist, socialist, fascist,
or communist. It possesses the internal structure of a nation, with a government (the
pigs), a police force or army (the dogs), a working class (the other animals), and state
holidays and rituals. Its location amid a number of hostile neighboring farms supports
its symbolism as a political entity with diplomatic concerns.

The Barn
The barn at Animal Farm, on whose outside walls the pigs paint the Seven
Commandments and, later, their revisions, represents the collective memory of a
modern nation. The many scenes in which the ruling-class pigs alter the principles of
Animalism and in which the working-class animals puzzle over but accept these changes
represent the way an institution in power can revise a community’s concept of history
to bolster its control. If the working class believes history to lie on the side of their
oppressors, they are less likely to question oppressive practices. Moreover, the
oppressors, by revising their nation’s conception of its origins and development, gain
control of the nation’s very identity, and the oppressed soon come to depend upon
the authorities for their communal sense of self.

The Windmill
The great windmill symbolizes the pigs’ manipulation of the other animals for their own
gain. Despite the immediacy of the need for food and warmth, the pigs exploit Boxer
and the other common animals by making them undertake backbreaking labor to build
the windmill, which will ultimately earn the pigs more money and thus increase their
power. The pigs’ declaration that Snowball is responsible for the windmill’s first collapse
constitutes psychological manipulation, as it prevents the common animals from

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doubting the pigs’ abilities and unites them against a supposed enemy. The ultimate
conversion of the windmill to commercial use is one more sign of the pigs’ betrayal of
their fellow animals. From an allegorical point of view, the windmill represents the
enormous modernization projects undertaken in Soviet Russia after the Russian
Revolution.

The central conflict of Animal Farm arises when the animals’ desire for freedom and
equality is corrupted by the consolidation of political power amongst the pigs. The
animals’ original goal is expressed in the first chapter, in Old Major’s teachings and
especially in “Beasts of England,” the song that becomes the anthem of Animal Farm.
At the beginning of the novella, political power is embodied by the farmer, Mr. Jones,
who indulges himself while the animals starve. The animals win easily when they rebel
against Mr. Jones, and as a result they make the mistake of thinking they have overcome
political power itself. In reality they have only overcome one of the forms that political
power can take. By the end of Chapter 2, when Napoleon steals the cows’ milk, the
political power becomes embodied by the pigs.

Chapters 2 –7 trace the development of the pigs’ power, and the other animals’
growing awareness that they have not achieved their goal after all. The pigs – and
Napoleon in particular – come to embody political power in three ways. First, they
claim more and more of the farms’ resources for themselves. They start by stealing milk
and apples, then eventually sell animal products to buy human luxuries like whisky.
Second, the pigs become more violent, introducing the dog police force and ordering
executions. Third, the pigs claim the power to determine what truth is. Squealer changes
the Commandments of Animalism and the story of the Battle of the Cowshed.
Meanwhile, the animals slowly come to realize that their lives are no better than they
were before the Rebellion.

The climax of the novella occurs in Chapter 7, when Napoleon decides to sell the hens’
eggs. The hens finally recognize that the pigs are their antagonists, and they rebel. Their
rebellion is brutally crushed and the hens are executed. Now, Boxer is the only character
still clinging to the hope that freedom can be achieved. He has worked tirelessly to
achieve this goal set forth by Old Major, which for Boxer is represented by his hope of
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one day retiring to a special pasture. However, when the time comes for Boxer to
retire, he is sold and killed. Boxer’s betrayal marks the moment in which political power
– embodied in Napoleon and the pigs – completely defeats the animals. In Animal
Farm’s final pages, the animals watch the pigs dining with human farmers, and find they
are unable to tell the difference between humans and pigs. The pigs have become one
with the human farmers because both groups are equally corrupted by the reality of
political power.

The animals, as a group, are the protagonists of Animal Farm. Their goal is to achieve
the vision set out by Old Major: equality and freedom for all animals. This goal brings
them into conflict with the reality of political power. First they must confront power
by rebelling against Mr. Jones. Later they must confront power in a more subtle and
dangerous form: the manipulation and deceit of the pigs. While the animals defeat Mr.
Jones easily, they are completely fooled by the pigs. By the time the animals recognize
that the pigs are stopping them achieving their goal, it is too late. The pigs are in a
position to kill any animals who continue to fight for their goal. By the end of the
novella, the animals cannot even sing “Beasts of England,” the song that expressed their
dream of equality and freedom. In the story’s last moments, the animals finally realize
what they have been up against. By defeating their human farmer, they have not
defeated the reality of political power. They have only exchanged one set of rulers for
another, identical set.

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