 Hello and welcome to our video summarizing the novella Animal Farm. In this video we'll look at important contextual information relating to the author himself George Orwell, as well as context relating to the story itself. Then we'll look at the novella as a whole summarizing the story in a nutshell. We'll then look at key characters in the novella before we finish off by examining key themes. So let's get started. Now to begin with, when it comes to George Orwell. He was born in 1903 in eastern India and he was the son of a British colonial servant. He then moved to England and was educated in Eton and he later joined the Imperial Indian police in Burma, which was that time a British colony. He resigned in 1927 to become a writer. In 1928 he moved to Paris to further his writing career, however it didn't quite take off and he ended up working in lots of menial jobs. He then changed politically to becoming an anarchist by the late 1920s and by the 1930s he considered himself a socialist and of course this is going to influence his writing of Animal Farm. In 1941 and 1943 Orwell worked on propaganda for the BBC, do you remember of course this was during the Second World War which started in 1939 and ended in 1945. So in 1943 George Orwell became the literary editor of the Tribune which was a left wing magazine. In 1945 which was essentially the end of the Second World War Orwell's Animal Farm was published and four years later he published 1984 another really really famous novel which was very politically focused. He died in 1950 of tuberculosis. Now when we're thinking about Animal Farm the novel itself firstly remember it's an allegory which is a story in which concrete and specific characters and situations stand for other characters so as to make a point of them. In other words an allegory is when we are discussing for example historical figures but we use other fictional characters to represent them. The main action of Animal Farm stands for the Russian Revolution in 1917 and the early years of the Soviet Union. So do you remember that prior to 1917 in Russia it used to be a monarchy so the kings and queens at the time up until 1917 were called Tsars however they were overthrown by a revolutionary group of people who wanted to establish Communism. Now in the book Animalism is really in place for Communism in other words it represents Communism. So in Manifarm where the action takes place in the novella is allegorical to Russia and the farmer Mr. Jones is a Russian Tsar so obviously you remember that this Tsar was the person who was the king prior to the overthrown. Old Major stands for either Karl Marx or Vladimir Lenin and Snowball represents the Intellectual Revolutionary Leon Trotsky. Napoleon stands for Stalin while the dogs are the KGP which are the police service. The horses boxer and clover stand in for the proletariat who are the working class and of course if these characters don't seem very familiar they are going to be by the time we finish off. Also the setting of Animal Farm is a dystopia which is an imagined world that's far worse than our own as opposed to utopia which is an ideal place or state in the future. If you're thinking about dystopian fiction other dystopian novels include Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 and of course also George Orwell's own 1984 book. The most famous line from Animal Farm is all animals are equal but some are more equal than others. This line is powerful as it's emblematic of the changes that George Orwell believed followed the 1917 Communist Revolution in Russia rather than eliminating the capitalist class system it was intended to overthrow. The revolution merely replaced it with another hierarchy. This line is also typical of Orwell's belief that those in power use the manipulate language in order to benefit themselves. Now let's look at the novella itself in summary. So Old Major a prize winning boar gathers the animals of the manor farm for a meeting in the big barn. He tells them of a dream he's had in which all animals live together with no human beings around to oppress or control them. He tells the animals that they have to work towards a paradise and he teaches them a song called Beasts of England in which his dream vision is lyrically described. The animals greet Major's vision with great enthusiasm. When he dies only three nights after the meeting three younger pigs Snowball, Napoleon and Squealer formulate his main principles into a philosophy called animalism. Late one night the animals manage to defeat the farmer Mr. Jones in a battle running him off the land. They rename the property animal farm and dedicate themselves to achieving Major's dream. The cart horse boxer devotes himself to the cause with a particular zeal committing his great strength to the prosperity of the firm and adopting as his personal maxim the affirmation I will work harder. At first animal farm really prospers. Snowball works at teaching the animals how to read and Napoleon takes a group of young puppies to educate them in the principles of animalism. When Mr. Jones reappears to take Barker's fam, the animals defeat him again in what becomes known as the Battle of the Cowshed and they take the farmers abandoned gun as a token of the victory. As time passes, however, Napoleon and Snowball increasingly quibble over the future of the farm and they begin to struggle with each other for power and influence among the animals. Snowball concocts a scheme to build an electricity generating windmill. Napoleon solidly opposes the plan. At the meeting to vote on whether to take up the project, Snowball gives a passionate speech. Although Napoleon gives only a brief retort, he then makes a strange noise and nine attack dogs. These are the puppies that Napoleon had confiscated in order to educate them. They burst into the barn and chased Snowball from the farm. Napoleon then assumes leadership of animal farm and declares that there will be no more meetings. From that point on he asserts that pigs alone will make all of the decisions. However, this is for the good of every animal. Napoleon then quickly changes his mind about the windmill and the animals, especially Boxer, devote themselves and their efforts to completing it. One day after a storm, the animals find the windmill has been toppled and destroyed and of course it's the windmill that worked so hard to create and to build. The human farmers in the area declare smugly that the animals made the walls too thin, but Napoleon claims that Snowball returned to the farm to sabotage it. He stages a great perch during which various animals who have allegedly participated in Snowball's great conspiracy, meaning any animal who opposes Napoleon's uncontested leadership, meet instant death at the teeth of the attack dogs. With his leadership unquestioned, Boxer, for instance, has taken up a second maxim, Napoleon is always right. Napoleon begins expanding his powers, rewriting history to make Snowball a villain. Napoleon also begins to act more and more like a human being, sleeping in a bed, drinking whiskey and engaging in trade with neighboring farmers. The original animalist principles had strictly forbidden such activities, but Squealer, who is Napoleon's propagandist, justifies every action to the animals, convincing them that Napoleon is a great leader and he's making things better for everyone, despite the fact that common animals are still cold and hungry and overworked. Mr. Frederick, who's a neighboring farmer, cheats Napoleon in the purchase of some chamber and then attacks the farm and dynamites the windmill, which had been rebuilt at great expense. After the demolition of the windmill, a pitched battle ensues during which Boxer receives huge wounds. The animals route the farmers, but Boxer's injuries weaken him. When he later falls while working on the windmill, he senses that his time has come. One day, Boxer is nowhere to be found. According to Squealer, Boxer has died in peace after being taken to the hospital, praising the rebellion with his last breath. In actuality, Napoleon has sold his most loyal and longest suffering worker to a glue maker in order to get money for whiskey. Years pass on animal farm and the pigs become more and more like human beings, walking upright, carrying whips and wearing clothes. Eventually, the seven principles of animalism known as the seven commandments and inscribed on the side of the barn become reduced to a single principle reading, all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others. Napoleon entertains a human farmer named Pilkinton at a dinner and declares his intent to ally himself with the human farmers against the laboring classes of both the human and animal communities. He also changes the name of animal farm back to manor farm, claiming that this title is the correct one. Looking in at the party of elites through the farmhouse window, the common animals can't no longer tell which are the pigs and which are the human beings. So now let's look at the characters in this novella. Let's start off with old major. So he's a wise and persuasive pig and he inspires a rebellion with his rhetorical skill and ability to get the other animals to share his indignation at their treatment. When he announces that he wishes to share the contents of his strange dream with his companions, all the animals comply, demonstrating the great respect they have for such an important, that is such a major figure. His speech about the tyranny of man is notable for its methodical enumeration of man's wrongs against animals. Old major lists all of man's crimes and rouses the other animals into planning a rebellion. He leads them in singing Beasts of England, which is another demonstration of his rhetorical skills. For after he teaches the animals a song about a world untainted by human hands, the animals sing it five times in succession. However, the flaw in his thinking is that he places total blame on man for all the ills that the animals face. He believes that man is capable only of doing harm and that animals are capable only of doing good. This one-dimensional thinking ignores the desire for power inherent in all living things which can only result in it being disproved. Also ironic is old major's admonition to the animals. Remember that in fighting against man, you must not come to resemble him. This warning is, of course, ignored by Napoleon and the other pigs who, by the novel's end, completely resemble the human masters. Snowball is another main character, and he's the animal most clearly attuned to old major's thinking. And he devotes himself to bettering the animals in intellectual, moral, and physical ways. He brings literacy to the farm so that the animals can better grasp the principles of animalism by reading the seven commandments he paints on the barn wall. He also reduces the commandments of single precept, four legs good, two legs bad, so that even the least intelligent animal can understand the farm's new philosophy. He is a thinker of the rebellion, and he shows great understanding of strategy during the battle of the cowshed. And while his various committees may fail, the fact that he attempts to form them reveals the degree to which he wants to better the animals' lives. His plan for the windmill is similarly noble since its construction could give the animals more leisure time. Another important character is Napoleon. So while Jones's tyranny can be somewhat excused due to the fact that he's a dull-witted drunkard, Napoleon's can only be ascribed to his blatant lust for power. The very first description of Napoleon presents him as a fierce-looking bore with a reputation for getting his own way. Throughout the novel, Napoleon's method of getting his own way involves a combination of propaganda and terror that none of the animals can resist. Note that, as soon as the revolution is won, Napoleon's first action is to steal the cow's milk for the pigs. Clearly, the words of old major-inspired Napoleon not to fight against tyranny but to seize opportunity to establish himself as a dictator. The many crimes he commits against his own comrades range from seizing nine poppies to educate them as his band of killer dogs to forcing confessions from innocent animals and then having them killed before all the other animals' eyes. His greatest crime, however, is his complete transformation into Jones. Although Napoleon is much more harsh and stern as a master than the readers let believe Jones ever was, and by the end of the novel, Napoleon is sleeping in Mr. Jones' bed, eating from his plate, drinking alcohol, wearing a derby hat, walking on two legs, trading with humans and sharing a toast with Mr. Pilkinton. His final act of propaganda, changing the seven commandment to all animals are equal but some more equal than others, reflects his unchallenged belief that he belongs in complete control of the farm. The other key character is Squealer, so every tyrant has a sycophant, which means close followers, and Napoleon has one in Squealer, who's a club of pig that could turn black into white. Throughout the novel, he serves as Napoleon's mouthpiece and minister of propaganda. Every time an act of Napoleon's is questioned by the other animals, regardless of how selfish or severe it may seem, Squealer is able to convince the animals that Napoleon is only acting the best interest in that Napoleon himself has made great sacrifices for animal farm. For instance, after Squealer's question about Napoleon stealing the milk and fallen apples, he explains that Napoleon and his fellow pigs must take the milk and apples because they contain substances absolutely necessary to the well-being of a pig. He further says that many pigs actually dislike milk and apples and tells the questioning animals is for your sake that we drink and eat, that milk and eat those apples. Also his physical skipping from side to side during such explanations parallels his skipping words, which are never direct and always skirt the obvious truth of the matter at hand. As the novel proceeds, he excuses Napoleon's tyranny and Sully's snowball's reputation just as Napoleon desires. The most outrageous demonstration of his skipping is when he convinces the animals that boxer was taken to a veterinary hospital instead of the knackers. The other key character of course is boxer. Standing almost six feet tall, boxer is a devoted citizen of the farm whose incredible strength is a great asset to the rebellion and the farm. As soon as he learns about animalism he throws himself into the rebellion's cause. At the battle of Kauschert, he proves to be a really valuable soldier knocking a stable boy unconscious with his mighty hoof. Note that boxer, however, is not blood thirsty and feels great remorse when he thinks he's killed the boy. He's rising early to work on the farm and his personal Mark Maxim, our work harder, shows his devotion to the animal cause. He also proves himself to be the most valuable member of the windmill building team. His great strength, however, is matched by his equally stunning innocence and naivety. He's not an intelligent animal and thus can only think in simple slogans, the second of which Napoleon was always right, reveals his childlike dependence on the all-knowing leader. Even when he collapses while rebuilding the windmill his first thoughts are not of himself but the work. He soaps of retiring with Benjamin after his collapse displayed the extent of his innocence since the reader knows that Napoleon has no intention of providing for an old, infirm horse. Even when he's being led to his death at the knackers, boxer needs to be told of his terrible fate by Benjamin and Clover. He becomes wiser than Napoleon's ways too late and his death is another example of Napoleon's tyranny. The other character is Molly, so unlike boxer who always thinks of others, Molly is actually a really shallow materialist who cares nothing for the struggles of her fellow animals. Her first appearance in the novel suggests her personality when she enters a meeting at the last moment during sugar and sitting in front so that all the others will be able to admire the red ribbons she wears on her mane. Her only concerns about the revolution are prompted by her ego. When she asks Snowball if they will still have sugar and ribbons after the rebellion, she betrays the thoughts of old major and reveals her vanity. She's lulled off the farm by the prospect of more material possessions than she could enjoy in an animal-governed world, marking her as one to whom politics and struggle mean nothing. The other character is Benjamin. So as horses are known for their strength, donkeys are known for their stubbornness and Benjamin stubbornly refuses to become enthusiastic about the rebellion. While all of his comrades delight in the prospect of a newly animal-governed world, Benjamin only remarks, donkeys live a long time. None of you has ever seen a dead donkey. While this reply puzzles the animals, the reader understands his cynical, yet not unfounded point. In the initial moments of the rebellion, Animal Farm seems a paradise, but in time it may become another form of the same tyranny against which they rebelled. Of course, also Benjamin is proven right by the novel's end and the only thing he knows for sure, life would go on as it has always gone on, but that is badly proves to be a definitive remark in the animals' lives. Although pessimistic, he is a realist. The other character is Moses. So with his tales of the promised land to which all animals retire after death, he's the novel's religious figure. Like his biblical counterpart, Moses offers his listeners descriptions of a place, which is Sugarcandy Mountain, where they can live free from repression and hunger. At first, the pigs find him irksome since they want the animals to believe that Animal Farm is a paradise and fear that the animals will be prompted by Moses' tales to seek a better place. Now, the other character is Mr. Jones. So Jones is the embodiment of the tyranny against which the animals rebel, and with good reason. He's an inept farmer, he's slovenly, and he cares little for man of farm and the animals who live there. The novel's first paragraph describes Jones forgetting out of drunkenness to shut the pop holes for the henhouses, but remembering to draw himself a glass of beer before lumbering off to a drunken sleep. The fact that the rebellion is sparked by his forgetting to feed the animals adds to the overall impression of him as just a simply uncaring master. And for the remainder of the novel, he's portrayed as an impotent has been, unable to reclaim his own farm and idling in a pub until his eventual death in an inebriated home. Long after Jones has been driven from the farm, the pigs invoke his name to scare the other animals into submission. Squealer's question. Surely comrades, you don't want Jones back. It elicits a knee-jerk reaction in the animals who fail to realise that spirit of Jones has returned despite the farmer's physical absence. Frederick is another important character and he's a crafty owner of Pinchfield, a neighbouring farm. Frederick is perpetually involved in lawsuits and reveals himself to be a cutthroat businessman. Despite his offers of sympathy to Jones about the rebellion at his farm, he inwardly hopes that he can somehow turn Jones's misfortune to his own advantage. He attempts this by offering to buy a load of timber from Napoleon, but paying for it with counterfeit notes. His subsequent attempt to take animal farm by force reveals him to be a man who always takes what he wants in short, exactly the kind of man against which the animals initially wanted to rebel. And by the novel's end, however, Napoleon has proven himself to be more greedy and double-dealing than Frederick at his worst. Pilkington is the other important character. He's the owner of Foxwood, a neighbouring farm in a disgraceful condition, and Pilkington becomes an ally to Napoleon. His alliance, however, has a rocky start when Napoleon changes the pigeon's message of death to Frederick to death to Pilkington, and Pilkington refuses to help when the farm is attacked by Frederick. However, Napoleon and Pilkington eventually reconcile, since they are an essence made of the same moral fibre and need each other to prosper. Also, in the novel's last scene, Pilkington praises what Napoleon has done with animal farm, getting more work out of the animals with less food and likening the lower animals to humanity's lower classes. The final moments of the novel, when Pilkington and Napoleon each attempt to cheat the other at cards, shows that their friendship is simply a facade, as each is using the other to better swindle the other. Now, when it comes to important themes, the first is tyranny. So tyranny, broadly speaking, is satirised in animal farm. Despite when it comes to Napoleon, despite his seemingly altruistic motives, Napoleon is presented as the epitome of a power-hungry individual who masks all of his actions with the excuse that they are done for the betterment of the farm. His stealing the milk and apples, for instance, is explained by the lie that these foods are nutritional, and this is essential for pigs who need the nutrients to carry on the managerial work. Also, Napoleon running Snowball off the farm is explained by the lie that Snowball was actually a traitor working for Jones, and that the farm will fare better without him. Every time that Napoleon and the other pigs wish to break one of the seven commandments, they legitimise the transgression by changing the commandment's original language. And whenever the farm suffers a setback, Napoleon blames Snowball's treachery, which the reader, of course, knows is untrue. Also, Napoleon's walking on two legs, wearing a derby hat and toasting in Pilkentown, reflects the degree to which he and the other pigs completely disregard the plight of the other animals in favour of satisfying their own cravings of power. So, tyranny remains a dominant theme in this novella. The other theme is the role of the population. So, all well doesn't imply that Napoleon is the only cause of the animal farm's decline. He satirises the different kinds of people whose attitudes allow people like Napoleon to succeed. He talks about Molly, whose only concerns are materialistic. Therefore, she, like people who are so self-centred, lack any political sense of understanding of what's happening around them. And of course, people like Napoleon use these kinds of people to succeed. Indeed, apolitical people like Molly, who care nothing for justice or equality, offer no resistance to tyrants like Napoleon. Also, Boxer is likened to the kind of blindly devoted citizen whose reliance on slogans prevents him from examining in more critical detail his own situation. So, although Boxer is a sympathetic character, his ignorance is almost infuriating and all suggest that this unquestioning ignorance allows rulers like Napoleon to thrive. The other important theme is that of religion and tyranny. So, all world strikes a satiric note on the idea of religion being the opium of the people in Karl Marx's words, because for instance, Moses, the raven, talks of sugarcandy mountain, which is representative of heaven. And this originally annoys many of the animals since Moses, known as a teller of tales, seems to be really unreliable. And at this point, the animals are still hopeful for a better future and thus dismiss Moses as a story of a paradise elsewhere. Yet, as their lives worsen, the animals start to believe him and they become docile. As long as there's a better place somewhere else, even after death, the animals will just trudge through their present lives. Thus, all world implies that religious devotion, viewed by many as a noble character trait, can actually distort the ways in which one thinks of his life here on earth and maybe stop them from improving and seeking self-improvement on earth. The other important theme is false allegiance and this is the way in which people proclaim the allegiance to one another, only to betray the two intentions at a later date. Now, rightly related to the idea that the rulers of the rebellion, the pigs, eventually betrayed the ideals for which they presumably fought. This theme is dramatized in a number of relationships involving the novel's human characters. Pilkington and Frederick, for instance, only listen to Jones in the red lion because they secretly hope to gain something from the neighbor's misery. Similarly, Frederick's spying the firewood from Napoleon seems to form an alliance that's shattered on the pig lens of Frederick's forged banknotes. The novel's final scene demonstrates that, despite all the friendly talk and flattery that passes between Pilkington and Napoleon, each one is trying to shoot the other. Of course, only one of the two is technically cheating but all world doesn't indicate which one because such a fact is unimportant. All world satirizes the modern times through this unusual setting and according to all world, rulers like Napoleon will continue to grow in number and empower and less people become more politically aware and more wary of these leader's noble ideals.