Animal Farm

Napoleon stops the animals from singing "Beasts of England" because it contains images of a rosier future in which the animals will be free of the whip, the saddle, and the spur and also have...

Squealer convinces the other animals to accept whatever Napoleon decides in a number of different ways. First and foremost, he resorts to propaganda, which he uses to considerable effect. Squealer...

In the final chapter of Animal Farm, the pigs erase the last remnants of Animalism. The animals can hardly remember a time when they dreamed of heated stalls or retirement. Their lives are filled...

It's in chapter 3 of Animal Farm that Napoleon appropriates the “nine, sturdy puppies” belonging to Jessie and Bluebell. As with any dictator, Napoleon understands the overriding importance of...

Squealer, who is in charge of propaganda, insists that when good food goes to the pigs and dogs, everyone benefits. The pigs and dogs do very important work, they run the farm.He also continues to...

Orwell wrote Animal Farm because he was disturbed at the British left's whitewashing of Josef Stalin's tyranny and atrocities. He feared that if Stalin's lies were accepted as truth and his...

By this stage in the story, the pigs are becoming more like humans every day. As well as lording it over the rest of the animals, they've also started to give themselves the kind of special...

In verbal irony, words mean the opposite of their intended meaning. In situational irony, events unfold in ways opposite of what might be expected. In dramatic irony, the reader or audience knows...

In Animal Farm, the milk and apples symbolize the unfairness of the system that the pigs run. In a larger sense, the milk and apples symbolize the graft that the communist party elite, including...

Orwell's celebrated novella Animal Farm is an allegorical tale of the 1917 Russian Revolution and the rise of the Soviet Union when Stalin exiled Leon Trotsky and began his tyrannical reign of...

In George Orwell’s allegorical tale of revolution among the animals on a farm, Animal Farm, sleeping in a bed with a mattress is considered a symbol of higher status at odds with the egalitarian...

In trying to inspire the animals to plan for rebellion and overthrowing human rule, Old Major uses hyperbole or exaggeration to describe the plight of the animals. He says they: are forced to work...

Fear is utilized as an effective propaganda technique in order to oppress and control the animals in Orwell's celebrated novella Animal Farm. Initially, Mr. Jones ruthlessly wields his authority by...

After the humans are gone, the animals begin establishing their society—on their terms. They destroy the humans' tools of oppression like whips and reins, rename the farm Animal Farm, and make...

Animalism is derived from what the animals were taught by Old Major, the now-deceased boar who represents Karl Marx in the book. Animalism is a highly idealistic system of thought based on the...

The most important quotes from Boxer are his two favorite sayings: "I will work harder" and "Napoleon is always right." I will include some other important quotations by and about Boxer. Boxer...

Although Napoleon is a tyrannical, violent, and oppressive leader throughout the novella Animal Farm, he does possess some positive character traits. Napoleon is a determined, ambitious,...

When the animals rebel against man and finally remove Mr. Jones and his ilk from the farm, they have thoughts of a life of equality, free from the drudgery and slavery that man had imposed upon...

Following The Battle of the Cowshed in chapter 4, the animals unanimously create two military decorations, which are titled "Animal Hero, First Class" and "Animal Hero, Second Class." Snowball and...

There have been two major film versions of George Orwell's Animal Farm: the 1954 animated version and the live-action film released in 1999. Both differ substantially from the book in different...

Snowball is used as a scapegoat because he is wrongly blamed for everything that goes wrong or might go wrong on the farm. In chapter 6, for example, the windmill that the animals spend so long...

By the time we reach the end of Animal Farm, the ruling pigs have become so much like humans that they've even started walking on two legs. It wasn't supposed to be like this. Old Major's teachings...

Boxer says, “I will work harder” in several places in the book Animal Farm. Unfortunately, there are a few different editions of the book. I cannot give you specific page numbers, because your...

The revolution started when Mr. Jones was too drunk to feed the animals or to milk the cows; due to Old Major's rhetoric about the animals being better at running the farm than the humans, the...

Napoleon had his reasons for taking away Jessie and Bluebell's puppies: he wanted them for his own nefarious purposes. According to Chapter 3, there were nine puppies in all. As soon as the puppies...

The missing milk, which transpires to have been taken by the pigs, foreshadows the ending of the novel. At the end, it turns out that the pigs’s ruse all along had not been to create a Utopian...

When we think of the characteristics that make a good leader, honesty, compassion, preparedness, bravery, and forward thinking come to mind. Snowball shows his honesty right up front, when Mollie...

To understand the significance of this quote, you need to look a little further back in the story. Remember that just before this change, the pigs find a case of whisky in the farmhouse cellar....

The animals say of Squealer that he "could turn black into white," which is what propaganda does by distorting the truth or dealing in outright lies to advance the agenda of a particular group....

The hens rebel because Napoleon took their eggs to sell to the humans. In Old Major’s speech, one of the things he calls attention to is the fact that the hens have to give up their eggs. He uses...

Napoleon is strangely absent during the Battle of the Cowshed. We see no sign of him during the fighting. It is Snowball who charges bravely at the humans, accompanied by all 35 pigeons, all the...

A vice is defined as morally depraved behavior, and the seven commandments issued by the pigs are as follows: 1. Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.2. Whatever goes upon four legs, or has...

Satire can be defined as a brand of humor used to expose stupidity and human vice, especially among the high and mighty in a given society. Indeed, satire is particularly effective when it is used...

In chapter seven, Squealer announces that Napoleon has accepted a contract through Mr. Whymper for four hundred eggs a week in exchange for grain and meal to keep the farm going until summer, when...

At the beginning of the story, Old Major explains to the animals that humans make their lives miserable and meaningless. Old Major encourages the animals to free themselves from human tyranny by...

A good hook draws in the reader and compels him or her to continue reading your essay. One way to attract the reader's attention is to include a short anecdote, or story, at the beginning of your...

By anyone's standards, Napoleon in Animal Farm is a very bad leader indeed. If a good leader is someone with a sense of mission higher than themselves, someone capable of galvanizing others...

Old Major's speech represents the original teachings that inspire the ideology of Animalism. His speech is an indictment of the human agricultural system that oppresses and brutalizes animals for...

By the end of the book, the gap between the pigs and the other animals, except for the dogs that guards the pigs, has grown very wide. The pigs live openly like humans. They reside in Farmer...

In the final chapter of the novella, Benjamin and Clover enter the barn and discover that the Seven Commandments have been painted over. The commandments have been replaced with one that simply...

The work load described in this quote shows that the farm is going back to the kind of involuntary toil that was characteristic of the animals' lives under the old regime of Farmer Jones. This is...

A physical setting is the place where the action occurs in the novel. It is described with at least some of the five senses—sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste—and creates a sense of mood that...

According to Old Major, man is the source of all the animals' problems. The animals have to wait on man for care because man gives the animals food. Yet, the only reason man is able to prosper is...

The Battle of the Cowshed in Animal Farm is significant because it represents the point of no return for the animals’ control of their farm. Even as most of the animals jubilantly celebrated their...

In the immediate aftermath of the Rebellion, the mood among the animals is exultant. Newly liberated, they are hopeful for the future. In this first phase of Animal Farm, life does seem to have...

To answer this question, take a look at Chapter Eight. After finding a case of whiskey in the farmhouse cellars, Napoleon over-indulges and finds himself very sick the next day. Believing that he...