is admirable. As the novella progresses, more of Benjamin's character is revealed and the reader discovers that he is the most sensible animal on the farm, who is jaded with different forms of government. His character allegorically represents the Russian intelligentsia during the rise of the Soviet Union.

Benjamin the donkey is a stoic. He doesn't get involved and does not even voice an opinion one way or another concerning the management of Animal Farm. Whenever questioned, he is purposefully evasive, giving such nonsense off-beat answers as "Donkeys live a long time."

Benjamin's "zen attitude" is hard to decipher. It is hard to know whether he is really that indifferent to what happens at the farm or if he is afraid of reprisal if he speaks his mind. Since he is so old, perhaps he has seen enough of life to know that the other animals' idealism cannot be practically applied and endure in the long run. Perhaps he is simply fatalistic, pessimist by nature, but doesn't want to be a "party pooper" and spoil the other animals' enthusiasm and joy. So he just keeps quiet.

Benjamin's silence is perhaps wise. He knows more than the other animals, but what will that knowledge change? Bejnamin's silence is a reprieve from a sentence yet to fall; Benjamin's silence is a foreboding of things to come.

One adjective that I think I would use to fully embrace Benjamin's character is "reflective."   Benjamin is reflective of Orwell, himself, and all that he represents in terms of understanding the true meaning of what is happening, but recognizing all too late his own helplessness in it.  Benjamin lacks the spirit of activism to do anything, preferring to disengage.  He only realizes too late when Boxer is condemned to die that his own silence emboldens those in the position of power, something that is evidenced in breaking his own promise of not speaking aloud his ability to read when Boxer is about to be taken to the Knacker's.  I think that another adjective that could be used to embrace his own complex state throughout the book is "awkward."  I think that Benjamin has an awkward relationship with his own beliefs of the animals on the farm.  Throughout the narrative, he simply does not care about the animals on the farm and seeks to withdraw from them.  Yet, when Boxer is sick and when he is gaining in age, it is Clover and Benjamin who urge him to stop working so hard and stand by him.  When Boxer falls sick, it is Benjamin who tries to rally the other animals to recognize what is happening.  Benjamin has a complex and awkward relationship to the other animals and his place amongst them.  He has an awkward time reconciling his own disillusion and a sense of hope that emerges regarding the few friendships he has on the farm.

"The oldest animal on the farm, and the worst tempered," Old Benjamin is a stubborn donkey. Intelligent but cynical about nearly all things in life, and especially the animal revolt, Benjamin represents qualities that author George Orwell displayed himself: misanthropic intellectualism. Benjamin can read "as well as any pig," but he sees little sense in doing so. Though he admires Boxer's hard work and considers him a friend, Benjamin rarely shows it except when Boxer is hauled away to the horse-slaughterer; Benjamin is the only animal who recognizes where Boxer is being taken, and he runs after the vehicle in the hope of saving his friend. It is too little, too late, however. Benjamin alone remains neutral concerning the leadership struggle between Snowball and Napoleon, and he maintains a negative outlook about change, believing that food will not be more plentiful--with or without the proposed windmill. In the end, Benjamin is the only animal who can remember all aspects of life before and after the animal revolution, assuring the animals that they would always suffer from

... hunger, hardship, and disappointment being, so he said, the unalterable law of life.