Animal Farm

At Manor Farm, Mr. Jones locks the hen-houses for the night but, because he is drunk, forgets to shut the pop-holes before going to bed. The animals gather in the big barn because word has spread that Old Major, the highly respected prize boar, had a strange dream and wants to speak once Jones is safely out of the way. Boxer and Clover, the dogs, pigs, hens, pigeons, sheep, cows, Muriel, Benjamin, Mollie, and the cat attend; Moses the raven is absent.

Before describing his dream, Old Major tells the animals that their lives are short, laborious, and dominated by humans who take the products of their work and kill animals once they are no longer useful. He argues that removing Man would allow the animals to keep the fruits of their own labor and calls on them to work for an eventual Rebellion, though he says he does not know when it will come.

When rats appear in the barn, Major asks whether wild creatures such as rats and rabbits should be treated as friends or enemies. The animals vote by an overwhelming majority that rats are comrades. Major then states principles the animals should preserve in their struggle: creatures on two legs are enemies, those on four legs or with wings are friends, and animals must not adopt human habits, tyrannize over one another, or kill one another. He concludes that all animals are equal.

Major finally explains that his dream showed the earth as it would be after Man had vanished and that it brought back an old song from his youth, "Beasts of England." He teaches the song to the animals, who sing it five times in excitement. The noise wakes Mr. Jones, who fires his gun into the darkness. The pellets strike the barn wall, and the animals disperse to their sleeping places.

Three nights after his speech, Old Major dies peacefully in his sleep and is buried at the foot of the orchard. During the next three months, Snowball, Napoleon, and Squealer develop Major's teachings into a system they call Animalism and hold secret meetings to explain it. Some animals remain attached to Jones or doubt the value of preparing for a rebellion that may come after their deaths. Mollie worries about sugar and ribbons, while Moses tells the animals about Sugarcandy Mountain. Boxer and Clover become the pigs' most faithful disciples.

The Rebellion arrives unexpectedly in June. After Mr. Jones spends Saturday night drinking in Willingdon, his men milk the cows on Sunday morning but go rabbiting without feeding the animals. Jones returns at midday and goes to sleep, leaving the animals still unfed by evening. A cow breaks into the store-shed, and when Jones and his four men enter with whips, the hungry animals attack them spontaneously and drive all five men off the farm. Mrs. Jones sees what is happening and leaves by another route with a few possessions; Moses flies after her.

The animals destroy or burn whips, bits, chains, nose-rings, knives, reins, halters, blinkers, nosebags, ribbons, and Boxer's summer hat. After sleeping, they tour the farm, enter the farmhouse cautiously, remove the hams for burial, break the beer barrel, and unanimously decide that the house should be preserved as a museum in which no animal will live. The pigs reveal that they have taught themselves to read and write. Snowball paints out the name Manor Farm and replaces it with Animal Farm, then writes the Seven Commandments on the barn wall as the law by which the animals are to live.

Before the hay harvest begins, the cows are milked into five buckets. When someone asks what will happen to the milk, Napoleon places himself in front of the buckets and says that it will be attended to while Snowball leads the animals to the hayfield. When they return that evening, the milk has disappeared.

The animals bring in the hay harvest despite having to work around tools designed for humans. The pigs direct and supervise rather than perform physical labor, while the horses handle mowing and raking especially well. The harvest is completed two days faster than under Jones and is the largest the farm has seen. Boxer works with exceptional effort, arranging to be awakened half an hour early for extra labor and adopting "I will work harder!" as his personal motto. Mollie often avoids work, the cat regularly disappears when work is underway, and Benjamin continues working without volunteering for anything extra.

On Sundays the animals raise a green flag designed by Snowball and hold a general Meeting in the barn. The pigs propose resolutions, and Snowball and Napoleon repeatedly oppose one another in debate. Snowball organizes committees and reading and writing classes. Most of the committees fail, but the literacy program has some success, with the animals reaching very different levels of reading and writing ability.

Because many animals cannot memorize the Seven Commandments, Snowball reduces them to the maxim "Four legs good, two legs bad." The birds initially object because they have two legs, but Snowball argues that wings should count as organs of propulsion rather than manipulation, and the maxim is painted above the Seven Commandments. The sheep learn it and repeat it frequently.

Napoleon takes little interest in Snowball's committees and says that educating the young is more important. After Jessie and Bluebell give birth to nine puppies between them, he takes the puppies after they are weaned and keeps them secluded in a loft, saying that he will be responsible for their education. The missing milk is meanwhile revealed to be mixed into the pigs' mash. The windfall apples, and later the main apple crop, are also reserved for the pigs. Squealer tells the other animals that milk and apples are necessary to the pigs' health because the pigs manage the farm, and he warns that Jones could return if the pigs failed in their duties. The other animals accept the arrangement because they do not want Jones to return.

By late summer, news of the Rebellion has spread across much of the county. Snowball and Napoleon send pigeons to neighboring farms to tell other animals about the uprising and teach them "Beasts of England." Mr. Jones spends much of his time at the Red Lion complaining about losing his farm. The neighboring owners, Mr. Pilkington of Foxwood and Mr. Frederick of Pinchfield, dislike one another but both fear the example set by Animal Farm. They first predict that the animals will fail, then circulate stories about starvation, fighting, cannibalism, and torture. Despite these stories, rebellious behavior and "Beasts of England" spread among animals in the surrounding countryside.

In early October, Jones and his men return with several men from Foxwood and Pinchfield to recapture the farm. Snowball, who has studied a book about Julius Caesar's campaigns, directs the defense. Pigeons and geese harass the invaders, followed by a second attack and a planned retreat that draws the men into the yard. Horses, cows, and pigs then emerge from an ambush behind them.

Jones fires at Snowball, leaving bloody pellet marks along his back, and a sheep falls dead. Snowball charges Jones and knocks him into a pile of dung. Boxer strikes a stable-lad from Foxwood in the head and believes that he has killed him, which leaves Boxer distressed. After the other men flee, the animals discover that the stable-lad was only stunned; he recovers and leaves while they are searching for Mollie, who had hidden in her stall when the gun went off.

The animals celebrate their victory and bury the dead sheep. They award "Animal Hero, First Class" to Snowball and Boxer and "Animal Hero, Second Class" posthumously to the sheep. They name the fight the Battle of the Cowshed and place Jones's gun at the foot of the flagstaff, to be fired each year on the anniversaries of the battle and the Rebellion.

As winter approaches, Mollie increasingly avoids work and complains of unexplained pains. Clover tells Mollie that, from some distance, she thought she saw one of Mr. Pilkington's men talking to her and stroking her nose across the hedge. Mollie denies it, but Clover later finds lump sugar and ribbons hidden in her stall. Three days later Mollie disappears. Weeks afterward, pigeons report seeing her harnessed to a smart dogcart near Willingdon while a man who looks like a publican strokes her nose, feeds her sugar, and gives her a ribbon. The animals thereafter stop mentioning her.

During the hard January weather, the pigs plan the coming season. The animals have come to accept that pigs decide farm policy subject to majority approval, but Snowball and Napoleon disagree repeatedly. Snowball often wins support during speeches, while Napoleon is more effective at gathering support between meetings, especially among the sheep. Their sharpest dispute concerns Snowball's proposed windmill. Snowball says it could generate electricity and eventually reduce the animals' work to three days a week; Napoleon argues that food production should take priority and that the windmill would lead to starvation. They also disagree about defense, with Napoleon favoring firearms and Snowball advocating wider rebellion on neighboring farms.

At the meeting where the windmill is to be put to a vote, Snowball's speech appears certain to carry the majority. Napoleon gives a high-pitched whimper, and nine large dogs rush into the barn and chase Snowball off the farm. The animals recognize the dogs as the puppies Napoleon took from their mothers and reared privately. Napoleon then announces that the Sunday debates will end. The animals will still gather on Sundays to salute the flag, sing "Beasts of England," and receive their orders, but farm decisions will be made privately by a committee of pigs headed by Napoleon. Four young pigs protest until the dogs growl, and the sheep's prolonged bleating prevents further discussion.

Squealer tells the animals that Napoleon has taken on the burden of leadership for their sake. He calls Snowball a criminal and says Snowball's role in the Battle of the Cowshed was exaggerated. Boxer eventually adopts "Napoleon is always right" alongside his earlier motto. Old Major's skull is placed by the flagstaff, and Napoleon begins delivering the weekly orders from a raised platform with Squealer, the poet Minimus, the dogs, and the other pigs around him.

Three Sundays after Snowball's expulsion, Napoleon announces that the windmill will be built after all, warning that the work may require reduced rations. Squealer later claims that Napoleon had always supported the windmill, that Snowball stole the plan from him, and that Napoleon's public opposition had been a tactic for getting rid of Snowball. The animals do not understand the explanation fully, but Squealer's persuasion and the nearby dogs' growling end their questions.

Throughout the year the animals work long hours on the windmill and the rest of the farm. They work sixty-hour weeks in spring and summer, and in August Napoleon adds Sunday-afternoon work that is officially voluntary but carries a half-ration penalty for absence. The harvest is smaller than the previous year's, and some planting is left undone. The animals initially cannot break the quarry stone because the available tools require standing on two legs, but they eventually use gravity by hauling boulders uphill and dropping them over the quarry edge. Boxer supplies much of the effort and continues working extra hours despite Clover's warnings not to overstrain himself.

Shortages of oil, nails, string, dog biscuits, iron, seeds, fertilizer, tools, and future windmill machinery lead Napoleon to announce trade with neighboring farms. He plans to sell hay and wheat and, if necessary, eggs. The animals feel uneasy because they remember, or think they remember, an early resolution against trade, money, and dealings with humans. The four young pigs object but are silenced by the dogs and sheep. Napoleon says Mr. Whymper, a Willingdon solicitor, will act as intermediary so the animals need not deal directly with humans. Squealer later insists that no anti-trade resolution was ever passed or even proposed and suggests that the memory may have come from Snowball's lies. Because no written record exists, the animals accept that they may have been mistaken.

The pigs later move into the farmhouse. Again, some animals think they remember a rule against this. Clover is especially troubled when she learns that the pigs sleep in beds, and Muriel reads the Fourth Commandment on the barn wall as "No animal shall sleep in a bed with sheets." Clover does not remember the words "with sheets." Squealer says the rule was always against sheets rather than beds themselves and invokes the pigs' need for rest and the danger of Jones's return. Soon afterward the pigs also begin rising an hour later than the other animals.

By autumn the windmill is almost half built, though food stores are limited after hay and grain have been sold. In November a violent gale damages the farm, uproots a tree, and blows down the flagstaff. The animals then discover that the windmill has been reduced to ruins. After examining the scene, Napoleon declares that Snowball destroyed it. Pig footprints are found nearby, and Napoleon identifies them as Snowball's and says he probably came from the direction of Foxwood. Napoleon sentences Snowball to death, offers rewards for his capture, and orders the animals to begin rebuilding the windmill immediately and continue through the winter.

The winter is bitter, and rebuilding the windmill becomes slow and exhausting. Food also runs short after much of the potato crop is ruined by frost. Napoleon decides that the shortage must be concealed from the outside world. Selected animals are told to speak within Mr. Whymper's hearing as though rations have increased, while nearly empty storage bins are filled with sand and covered with the remaining grain. Whymper is shown the bins and leaves believing that Animal Farm has no food shortage.

To obtain grain, Napoleon contracts through Whymper to sell four hundred eggs a week. The hens, preparing to hatch their spring clutches, resist by laying eggs from the rafters so that they smash on the floor. Napoleon stops their rations and orders that any animal who gives them food will be punished by death. After five days the hens give in. Nine hens die during the confrontation, and the farm announces that they died of coccidiosis. The eggs are then delivered as contracted.

Reports about Snowball multiply. He is first rumored to be hiding at Foxwood or Pinchfield, depending on Napoleon's timber negotiations. Later it is said that Snowball enters Animal Farm at night to steal food and damage property, and ordinary mishaps are increasingly attributed to him. Napoleon tours the farm and repeatedly says that he can smell Snowball's traces. Squealer then announces that Snowball has sold himself to Frederick and claims that newly discovered documents prove Snowball had been Jones's secret agent from before the Rebellion. When Boxer objects that he personally saw Snowball fight bravely at the Battle of the Cowshed, Squealer offers a different account of the battle and finally says that Napoleon has categorically declared Snowball a longtime agent. Boxer accepts Napoleon's judgment.

Four days later Napoleon assembles the animals. His dogs seize the four young pigs who had protested when the Sunday debates were ended, and three dogs also attack Boxer until he pins one beneath his hoof and releases it on Napoleon's order. The four pigs confess to working with Snowball, helping destroy the windmill, and agreeing to surrender the farm to Frederick; the dogs kill them. Three hens, a goose, and several sheep then make further confessions and are also killed. By the end, a pile of corpses lies before Napoleon. The narrator notes that no animal had killed another animal on the farm since Jones's expulsion until this day.

The remaining animals gather near the windmill. Boxer responds by deciding to work still harder. Clover thinks about the free and equal society she had imagined after Old Major's speech and recognizes that the present fear and killings are not what the animals had hoped for, though she remains committed to working, obeying Napoleon, and preventing Jones's return. She begins "Beasts of England," and the animals sing it three times. Squealer then announces that Napoleon has forbidden the song because, he says, the Rebellion is complete and its enemies have been defeated. Minimus's new song praising Animal Farm replaces it at Sunday ceremonies, but the animals do not think it equals "Beasts of England."

A few days after the executions, some animals remember, or think they remember, that the Sixth Commandment said no animal should kill another animal. Clover asks Muriel to read it. On the wall it reads, "No animal shall kill any other animal without cause." The animals conclude that the killings did not violate the wording because the victims had been treated as traitors, while the narrator states that the final two words had somehow slipped from their memory.

The animals work still harder to finish the windmill, while Squealer reads statistics claiming large increases in food production even though the animals sometimes feel they are working longer and eating no better than under Jones. Napoleon appears less often in public, surrounded by dogs and preceded by a cockerel. He is given elaborate titles, credited with the farm's successes, and praised in a poem by Minimus that Napoleon has painted on the barn wall beneath his portrait. After three hens confess to a plot to murder Napoleon, they are executed, and a young pig named Pinkeye begins tasting Napoleon's food for poison.

Negotiations over the farm's timber shift repeatedly between Frederick and Pilkington. Although Napoleon publicly appears friendly with Pilkington and denounces Frederick, he later announces that he has sold the timber to Frederick and says he had secretly been dealing with him throughout the apparent friendship with Foxwood. Frederick pays in five-pound notes, but three days later Whymper reports that the notes are forgeries. Napoleon sentences Frederick to death and sends pigeons to seek renewed relations with Pilkington.

Frederick attacks the next morning with fifteen men and several guns. The animals are driven back, and Frederick's men use blasting powder to destroy the completed windmill. Enraged, the animals charge again. A cow, three sheep, and two geese are killed and nearly every animal is wounded, but the animals eventually drive the men from the farm. Boxer points out that they have only regained the ground they already held and have lost the windmill; Squealer calls that recovery a victory. The battle is named the Battle of the Windmill, the dead animals are buried, and Napoleon awards himself the new Order of the Green Banner.

A few days later the pigs discover whisky in the farmhouse cellar and spend the night drinking and singing. The next morning Squealer announces that Napoleon is dying and Napoleon decrees that drinking alcohol is punishable by death, but he recovers quickly. He then has Whymper buy books on brewing and distilling and orders the retirement paddock ploughed for barley. Soon afterward, the animals hear a crash at night and find Squealer stunned beside a broken ladder at the wall bearing the Seven Commandments, with a lantern, paintbrush, and overturned pot of white paint nearby. The animals do not understand the scene, although Benjamin appears to. A few days later Muriel reads the Fifth Commandment as "No animal shall drink alcohol to excess." The animals had remembered it without the final two words.

The animals begin rebuilding the windmill immediately after the Battle of the Windmill. Boxer's split hoof heals slowly, but he refuses to rest and wants to see the windmill well under way before he reaches the retirement age of twelve. Clover and Benjamin repeatedly urge him to work less. Rations are reduced again for every animal except the pigs and dogs, while Squealer reads figures claiming that food, health, working hours, and other conditions are better than under Jones. The animals remember the old days poorly and accept his comparisons despite their present hunger and cold.

Four sows give birth to thirty-one young pigs, whose parentage the animals can guess because Napoleon is the farm's only boar. Napoleon teaches the young pigs in the farmhouse kitchen, and rules increasingly separate pigs from the other animals. The farm remains short of money, so hay and potatoes are sold and the weekly egg contract rises to six hundred. Barley is reserved for the pigs, each pig receives beer, and Napoleon receives a much larger daily ration. Napoleon also establishes weekly "Spontaneous Demonstrations" of marching, speeches, songs, and statistics. In April Animal Farm is declared a Republic; Napoleon is the only presidential candidate and is elected unanimously. On the same day it is announced that newly discovered documents show Snowball fought openly on Jones's side at the Battle of the Cowshed and led the human forces. These claims reverse the animals' earlier memory of the battle.

Moses returns after several years and again describes Sugarcandy Mountain. The pigs publicly call his stories lies but allow him to remain without working and give him a daily beer ration. Boxer continues to weaken while working. In summer, with retirement only about a month away, he collapses while hauling stone and says that his lung is injured. Squealer says Napoleon is arranging for Boxer to be treated at a veterinary hospital in Willingdon.

Two days later a closed van arrives while most animals are working. Benjamin reads the lettering on its side and identifies it as belonging to Alfred Simmonds, a horse slaughterer and glue boiler. The animals conclude that Boxer is being taken to the knacker and shout for him to escape. Boxer tries to kick his way out but no longer has the strength, and the van carries him away. He is never seen again.

Three days later Squealer announces that Boxer died in the Willingdon hospital. He says he was present for Boxer's final hours, reports last words praising Animal Farm and Napoleon, and tells the animals that the veterinary surgeon had purchased the former knacker's van without repainting its old lettering. The animals accept his explanation. Napoleon later praises Boxer and announces a memorial banquet. On the banquet day a grocer's van delivers a large crate to the farmhouse; that night there is loud singing and a quarrel among the pigs. The next day word spreads that the pigs have somehow obtained money to buy another case of whisky. The source does not independently resolve how Boxer died or where the money for the whisky came from.

Years pass, and few animals remain who remember life before the Rebellion. Clover, Benjamin, Moses, and some pigs survive, while Muriel, Bluebell, Jessie, Pincher, Jones, and others are dead; Snowball and Boxer are largely forgotten. Clover is already two years beyond the stated retirement age, and no animal has ever actually retired. New animals know the Rebellion mainly through stories. The farm has expanded by two fields bought from Pilkington, and the windmill has finally been completed. It is used to mill corn for profit rather than to generate electricity, while the animals are building a second windmill that is said eventually to receive dynamos.

The farm is richer and better organized, but the ordinary animals remain hungry, cold, and hard-working. Squealer continues to produce statistics showing improvement, while Napoleon rejects the old promises of electric lights, hot and cold water, and a three-day workweek and says happiness lies in hard work and frugal living. The animals cannot reliably compare current conditions with the past, although Benjamin says hunger, hardship, and disappointment have always remained much the same. Even so, the animals remain proud that Animal Farm is owned and operated by animals and continue to believe that Old Major's wider Republic of the Animals will someday come.

In early summer Squealer takes the sheep away for a week, saying he is teaching them a new song in private. Soon after their return, Clover and the other animals see Squealer walking on his hind legs, followed by the other pigs and finally Napoleon, upright and carrying a whip. Before the other animals protest, the sheep repeatedly chant, "Four legs good, two legs better!" Clover then leads Benjamin to the barn wall. Benjamin reads it for her and finds that the Seven Commandments are no longer there; the wall contains only one Commandment: "ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL BUT SOME ANIMALS ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS."

The pigs supervising farm work soon carry whips. They acquire a wireless set, plan a telephone, subscribe to newspapers and magazines, smoke a pipe, and wear Mr. and Mrs. Jones's clothes. A week later neighboring farmers tour the farm and dine with the pigs. Mr. Pilkington praises Animal Farm for making its lower animals work more while receiving less food and says the farmers and pigs share similar labor problems.

Napoleon tells the visitors that the pigs do not seek revolution on neighboring farms. He announces that the animals will no longer address one another as "Comrade," that the ceremony at Old Major's skull has ended and the skull has been buried, and that the hoof and horn have been removed from the green flag. He then abolishes the name Animal Farm and restores the name Manor Farm. After the pigs and farmers resume their card game, an argument erupts when Napoleon and Pilkington each play an ace of spades. Looking through the window, the animals hear twelve similar angry voices and can no longer distinguish the pigs from the humans.