Animal Farm Plot
Summary
One night the prize boar, Old
Major, tells all the other farm animals he has realized that the misery of their daily
lives is all due to the tyranny of human beings, and that if they work to overthrow the
human their lives will become easy and comfortable.
The story is set on the Manor Farm, owned and
operated by Mr. Jones.
After Old Major dies, the pigs (led
by the two boars Snowball and Napoleon) start teaching his ideas (which they develop
into a system of thought called Animalism) to the other animals. A few months later, Mr.
Jones gets drunk and forgets to feed the animals, who become so hungry that they rebel
and drive the human beings off the farm. They rename the farm 'Animal Farm' and write
the Seven Commandments of Animalism up on the wall of the barn. Jones comes back with a
group of armed men and tries to recapture the farm, but the animals, led by Snowball,
defeat the men.
Snowball and Napoleon argue constantly over
plans for the future of the farm, never able to agree - especially over a windmill which
Snowball wants to build to provide the farm with electric power, and which Napoleon
ridicules. Napoleon calls in nine dogs whom he has specially trained and they chase
Snowball off the farm. Squealer, the very persuasive pig who relays most of Napoleon's
decisions to the other animals, tells them that Snowball was a traitor in league with
Jones, and that the windmill was really Napoleon's idea anyway and will go
ahead.
The animals work hard - work on the windmill is slow
and they rely heavily on Boxer the cart-horse, who is very strong and hard-working.
Napoleon begins trading with nearby farms, and the pigs move into the farmhouse and
sleep in the beds there - even though sleeping in beds likehumans was forbidden by
the original principles of Animalism.
The winter is
difficult - the animals have little food. Napoleon and Squealer blame Snowball for
everything that goes wrong on the farm, from bad crops to blocked drains. Then
Napoleon's dogs attack four pigs, who then confess to plotting with Snowball and start a
series of confessions of various 'crimes' from other animals - all of those who confess
are slaughtered by the dogs, leaving the survivors shaken and
miserable.
The windmill is finally completed and to get
money to buy the machinery for it, Napoleon decides to sell a pile of timber - after
wavering between the two neighboring farmers Pilkington and Frederick, he sells it to
Frederick only to discover that he has been paid with worthless forged banknotes.
Frederick and his men then come on to the farm and blow thewindmill to pieces with
explosives, although the animals manage to drive them off the farm again after a bloody
battle. A few days later the pigs find a case of whisky in the farmhouse cellar and get
drunk.
Boxer is injured while working on repairs to
the windmill, and Benjamin notices that the van Napoleon calls to send him to the vet,
has 'Horse Slaughterer' painted on the side. After Boxer has 'died in hospital' under
care of the vet, the pigs mysteriously find money to buy another case of
whiskey.
After many years, life is just as hard as it ever
was. The pigs start walking on two legs. None of the old Commandments are left on the
barn wall. Agroup of human farmers come to see the farm, they quarrel with the pigs over
a game of cards - and the animals discover they can no longer tell which is human and
which is pig.
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