Book Report 1 - Animal Farm

Joseph Ng

The book I read was Animal Farm by George Orwell. This is a fictional book. The book is about animals having a revolution and taking over the farm. The animals felt that it was ran poorly by the human master, and they were taken advantage of. It takes place in a manor farm in England. The characters are animals, and they portray historic figures such as Josef Stalin, and the secret police. The story and the themes represent Communism and how corrupt it is. The book is a parody on Communism. The narrator of the story is the author, George Orwell. The point of views are all from the narrator. The major conflict is the theme of man versus nature. Nature (animals) takes over and man couldn’t do anything about it. As time goes on, the boars become more and more human, and starts to cooperate with the humans.

An important figure of the book was Old Major (the boar). Although he was only actually in the story for one chapter, his influence is why he was important. He started the revolution by speaking in front of all the animals. "Man is the only real enemy we have. Remove man from the scene a, and the root cause of hunger and overwork is abolished forever." He also warned that no animal must ever live in a house, sleep in a bed or act like a human. After his speech, he died three days later. However, after he died, the smarter animals of the farm planned out what to do to take over the farm. This was the most important character of the story because the started the revolution. Without his inspiring speech, there would not have been a revolution, and nothing would have happened. In addition, the fact that he died and was not the leader himself in the revolution played a great part in how the animals were treated later on in the story, and the corruption the rule and Napoleon and the other pigs/boars.

The one main character of the story was Napoleon (boar). He used the revolutionary idea of Major and manipulated the animals with it. He eventually became the lone leader of the farm, and had attributes to the real-life Josef Stalin. In the early chapters, there were a bunch of puppies that disappeared. They were trained by Napoleon to be his secret police and bodyguard. Since the beginning, he had a hidden agenda. He had different people to do different things for him. He had a pig name Squealer do the public speaking, news and the rewriting of the commandments. He was in a lot of the important situations in the story. His lies and deceptions kept the people under control. He broke all the commandments, and it eventually became only one; "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."

Another important character was Snowball. He was considered a war hero to the other animals of the farm for his bravery when the humans came and attacked the farm. He was also important because he was a co-leader along with Napoleon in the beginning and wrote the "Seven Commandments." Snowball was a true leader for the movement. His cause was not to benefit himself unlike Napoleon. His idea was to spread the animal revolution for other farms. He recommended that a windmill should be built so that there would be less work for the animals. He was attacked by Napoleon’s personal guards (dogs that Napoleon trained) and ran away. When the windmill was built for the first time, it was destroyed and was blamed on Snowball. Snowball was one of the animals that wanted the movement to happen. He wanted all animals to be equal and didn’t want any one particular class to have more freedom than all other. If he were the leader of the farm, equality would have probably prevailed.

The major conflict was between characters. The two boars Napoleon and Snowball were in a struggle for power. Both had different views and different opinions. Snowball was truly for the movement. He defended the farm when it was under attack. Napoleon had his own agenda, and mainly wanted to be the ruler over the farm. The turning point of the conflict was when Napoleon ordered the dogs to attack Snowball. After Snowball left, Napoleon was the lone ruler and manipulated the animals and it became a totalitarian farm.

The other conflict was the animals versus humans. Before and after the revolution, there was resentment towards humans. They resented humans so much that five out of the seven commandments were created because if they were human attributes. The humans tried to take over Animal Farm several times, but was unsuccessful. Animals not of the boar class resented humans even more. The boars such as Napoleon had less problems with them, because they become more human as time went on. Napoleon went on to break all of the commandments. He even traded with farmers and made money. At the end, they had a big dinner with local farmers to celebrate the success of the farm. The conflict within the conflict however is about how power corrupts everything, and when it gets to a certain point, a revolution will occur.

The greatest tension of the story was the battle with the humans. The farmers tried to come and take back the farm. They were unsuccessful however. The animals won had a defensive plan because they anticipated an attack. The animals hold win, and they keep running the farm.

The novel ends with the pigs having a celebration party with humans. The pigs become human like by wearing human clothes, drinking alcohol, sleeping in beds, walking with two legs, and in particularly trading and dealing with money. "Twelve voices were shouting in anger, and they were all alike. No question, now, what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which." The animals are once again being mistreated, however, this time they were being oppressed by other animals, and being treated more harshly. The author has several messages. Since this book was based on the totalitarian regime, this book represents the characters as the Russian government figureheads, secret police and the lower classes of animals as the citizens that gets mistreated. This relates to the cold war, and how the United States won the Cold War and that we live in a democratic country.

I liked this book because it was easy to understand. This book was easy to read and understand. It was somewhat funny because of the way they presented animals as realistic figures. Another thing I liked is how the author used personification on the animals, and how cleverly written it was. The only thing I disliked was how the pigs were able to speak with humans. The book didn’t change my attitudes or opinion because I thought that communism wouldn’t prevail in any society. Also, I think that totalitarian states will always have a downfall, and there was a bit of foreshadowing in the last chapter that Napoleon would be overthrown.