Review Character Web in the Front of Your Books!
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Animal Farm: Study Guide Questions Review Character Web in the front of your books!
CHAPTER 1
1. In what ways are Jones and Russian Czar Nicholas II similar? In what ways are the animals on the farm similar to the people under Nicholas’ leadership? Compare these two original environments.
2. Consider how the animals arrange themselves at the beginning of the novel when they filter in to hear Old Major’s speech. What do you notice and how is this significant to the rest of the story?
3. Summarize the major points of Old Major’s speech. Track the details that surround each of these major points.
4. What motto does Old Major give the animals and why?
5. Who was Karl Marx and how is Old Major similar to him? What is Animalism similar to in light of this comparison?
6. Consider the Seven Commandments below:
a. No animal shall ever live in a house (caring more about possessions)
b. No animal shall ever sleep in a bed (becoming lazy, and picking sleep/luxury over hard work)
c. No animal shall ever wear clothes (pride in appearance)
d. No animal shall ever drink alcohol (drinking to excess leads to forgetting responsibilities)
e. No animal shall ever smoke tobacco (health-ruining, expensive habit)
f. No animal shall ever touch money (money leads to greed and corrupts)
g. No animal shall engage in trade (profit making leads to greed and corruption)
h. No animal shall ever tyrannize his own kind (slavery and oppression)
i. No animal shall kill another animal (murder)
j. All animals are equal (competition is only self-serving; the group is more valued) Animal Farm: Study Guide Questions What was the original purpose of these laws? How does the value of them change over time? Why? How is each rule eventually broken? What does this say about the new authority on the farm?
7. What is the purpose of the song, “Beasts of England”? What imagery does it present and what is its message? To what emotions does it appeal? What role does it play on the farm up until its expulsion?
CHAPTER 2
8. How do the animals manage to overthrow Jones? What is the “last straw” that makes them do it?
9. What do the animals do in celebration after the humans are chased from the farm? Also, what do they do to the farmhouse? As you review this part, pay attention to how it changes later in the story.
10. NOTE: The pigs do not like the raven, Moses, and his stories about Sugarcandy Mountain. This scenario represents the fact that oppressive rulers don’t typically encourage religion, or a belief in a higher power, because they want to be considered the highest power. They want the society to put all belief in them instead of a religion. This is likely why Moses leaves during Napoleon’s brutal reign.
11. Consider education on the farm post-human leadership. What do the academic behaviors of the animals seem to foreshadow about the future of Animal Farm?
CHAPTERS 3-4
12. What further differences between the pigs and the animals begin to surface during these two chapters?
13. What does Napoleon do to “finetune” the education system? How does this play a role later in the story?
14. Begin your analysis/review of Squealer’s behavior. (Review each of his speeches from here on out!) In these chapters, how does he manage to convince the other animals to accept whatever Napoleon decides? Animal Farm: Study Guide Questions 15. Review the details of the Battle of the Cowshed. Begin considering how these details change much later in the book.
16. What was Snowball’s part in this battle? Where is Napoleon during this battle?
17. What is ironic about the various medals awarded after this battle? Provide several reasons why it stands opposite the animals purpose, their values, and their roles in the battle.
18. How do the animals decide to honor their success in the Battle of the Cowshed each year?
CHAPTER 5
19. Why does Mollie run away from the farm? Consider all the details surrounding this scene.
20. Who does she represent in light of the Russian Revolution and why?
21. Explain the windmill controversy from Snowball’s point of view.
22. Explain the windmill controversy from Napoleon’s point of view.
23. What major changes does Napoleon make after his dogs chase Snowball off the farm? Consider how the weekly meetings are much different without him and track these details.
24. Note how the animals now arrange themselves when they enter the barn to receive their orders as compared to the description in Chapter 1.
25. What do the dogs represent? What is the importance of them accompanying Squealer when him comes to talk to the animals?
CHAPTERS 6-7
26. How much work are the animals doing? What do we realize as the audience?
27. Why does Napoleon engage in trade with the neighboring farms? How is this similar to real world events? Consider specific countries that these actions align with and why.
28. Does Snowball destroy the windmill? Review the details of this tragedy to uncover evidence for or against.
29. Why does Napoleon order the hens’ eggs to be sold? What do they do in protest and what happens to them as a result? Animal Farm: Study Guide Questions 30. Why does Napoleon insist that the farm is being sabotaged by Snowball in the night? What purpose does this serve?
31. NOTE: A difficult concept, consider why the animals confess to being traitors during the executions. Why would they do this? Look at it this way…the four pigs who are taken first are the same four who previously disagreed with Napoleon’s decisions to trade. They probably feel guilty of not wholeheartedly supporting Napoleon’s policies, so to lighten their heavy hearts, they confess; they never expect to be killed as a result (after all, the 7 Commandments forbid it!). However, death is their punishment. Next, the three hen confess for their wrongdoing, which they truly did, and they cite Snowball as the cause because they are conditioned to believe that he is the cause of all troubles on the farm, a psychological manipulation. The rest of the animals follow suit out of private guilt of their unhappiness on the farm, but each time, they’re hoping for mercy from their “caring” leader, again, an idea they are conditioned to believe.
a. Review the articles from the packet I gave you entitled “The Great Purges” and “Classical Conditioning/Pavlov” to help you piece this together further in relationship to similar events that occurred during Stalin’s reign.
b. Also, Google “mass hysteria.” This had a lot to do with the animals’ odd behavior as well.
32. Why does Napoleon order the animals to stop singing “Beasts of England”?
CHAPTER 8-9
33. What purpose is served by the production figures that Squealer lists off to the animals? Notice how he manipulates facts and statistics about the farm’s productivity. Why would he do this?
34. How is Napoleon becoming more and more like a typical dictator? Consider his behaviors at this point.
35. Describe the sale of the stack of lumber. (Napoleon plays the men against each other until he supposedly gets the price he wants, but when he finally sells selfishly to the one he wants to sell to, not the one he promised to sell to, it blows up in his face because he is paid in forged banknotes. When Frederick attacks the farm, Pilkington refuses to offer help out of spite!)
36. Why do the men blow up the windmill? What do they see it as a symbol of?
37. The animals celebrate their victory in the Battle of the Windmill, but at what cost? Animal Farm: Study Guide Questions 38. Describe the whiskey incident. How does Napoleon feel directly after? A few days after?
39. How does alcohol take precedence over the hardworking animals on the farm?
40. Why are the animals so easily fooled, even when they find Squealer with a ladder and white paint beside the barn at night?
41. What are the living conditions like for the animals except the pigs and dogs at this point?
42. NOTE: Chances are, Napoleon allows Moses to return to the farm to talk about Sugarcandy Mountain at this point because they have no hope at all since the living conditions are so bad; at least he gives them the smallest ounce of hope to keep them going by telling these stories of a “better life”.
43. What happens to Boxer? How do the animals manage to accept this? How do the pigs benefit from Boxer’s death?
44. Why does Benjamin wait so long to speak up?
CHAPTER 10
45. What changes to the population have the years brought to the farm? How does this impact the story as a whole?
46. At the end of the novel, the narrator indicates that one could look from animal to pig and from pig to animal and see no difference. Explain how this is physically true. Then explain what is meant by this in terms of personal character of both groups.