Title: Animal Farm Author: George Orwell Year of release: 1945 (couldn't discover this in the book, I used

the internet for this) Number of pages: 128 in total Genre: English Novel Satire Literature catagory: After-war literature My expectations beforehand: When I began reading Animal Farm I didn't expect the animals would be capable of talking, which surprised me. My expectation was something like the animals will not like it at the farm, so there probably will be a rebellion (which was true at certain points). Also, the book was quite easy to read, since it was a pretty modern book... and most of these books aren't that easy to read. A pleasant surprise! Summary: The story is about a farm, called manor farm. The farmer, Mr. Jones, is really bad to the animals, and so the rebellion begins. an Elder pig gives the animals a last objective before he dies: to start an uprise, with the goal to take control of the farm. This plan succeeds, and the farm receives a new name: Animal Farm. The pigs are the smartest beings on the farm, so they take the leading role. One of these pigs is Napoleon, who becomes the leader of Animal Farm. Slowly the idea of 'all animals together in peace' starts to break down, and Napoleon slightly becomes more of a dictator. At the end, the other animals on the farm discover that Napoleon isn't any better than any human, and that Napoleon is even cooperating with humans! Analysis: George Orwell used the 'third person perspective' method, since he told the story about the animals to the reader. Also, the story already happened, since it was all written in historical form. A very interesting fact is that this story is based on the history of the Russian revolution. You can clearly see the roles given to the animals representing important historical characters. Important characters: The following characters I am going to describe, are the most important persons, ahum, animals, in the book; they are necessary for the storyline.
Mr.Jones

The owner of Manor Farm. He treated the animals very badly, and he got defeated by the animal revolution and had to leave his own farm. Later Mr.Jones came back to claim his farm; but this wasn't enough and he got defeated by the animals again.
Napoleon:

A very clever and mean pig. Napoleon couldn't handle the power he had, and thus he abused his power. Napoleon symbolised Stalin.

Snowball:

Snowball was a good talker, had clever ideas and he wasn't as mean as Napoleon. Snowball had the leading role in the rebellion, but he got soon chased out by Napoleon. Napoleon used Snowball as victim for unexplained happenings; he gave Snowball the guilt. Snowball was one of the pigs too, and symbolises Trotsky.
Boxer:

Boxer the horse, he was the hard working type, Boxer wouldn't give up, and was as strong as ten horses. He got ill (more detailed; his lungs gave up) and was brought to the Horse Slaughterer (to make glue of him, I believe). All the other animals thought that he was brought to the hospital, because Napoleon said so (the animals did knew Boxer was brought to the Horse Slaughterer, but they believed Squealer's words). Boxer symbolises all of the workers in Russia.
Squealer:

He was also a very smart talker, he could change every animal's thoughts about a recently happened incident. Squealer was a small, fat, underhand, and nasty pig. He was helping Napoleon, just like all of the other pigs. Some of the others even said Squealer could convert black to white.
Major:

The great animal leader on the farm before the rebellion. Major was an elder pig and he thought deeply about life, and he found himself the wise old man. He told the animals of Manor Farm that humans were evil, and that a rebellion was the solution to their misery. Major died before the rebellion of old age. I am not perfectly sure, but I think Old Major symbolises Karl Marx. Deepening: Here I will tell you something about George Orwell the author of this book. George Orwell (which was a pseudonym for Eric Arthur Blair) was born on 25 June 1903, Bihar (which lies in India). He was from a scottish family, and worked for five full years as a civil servant in Birma. In 1927 George received dispensation, and he went to England. He didn't live long in England though; he moved after one year to France, where his aunt lived too. George Orwell made his author's debut on 1933, whith his book 'Down and Out in Paris and London'. He married Sonia Brownell in 1949, but George was ill and died of tuberculosis, 21 January 1950. Movies/Cartoons In 1955 the cartoon 'Animal Farm' was released, a beautiful cartoon following the story of Animal Farm.

Years later the movie was released, which combined human actors with cartoon images, this was possible due to better technology. The movie was released in 1999.