PLOT SUMMARY (STRUCTURE)

The plot structure of 'Animal Farm' is fairly simple and straightforward. The first chapters are concerned with the rising action, when the animals rebel and seize the farm, when Snowball and Napoleon vie for leadership, when Snowball is expelled, and when Napoleon sets himself up as the dictatorial leader of the farm. The climax is reached when he declares Animal Farm a republic and elects himself as the President. The true reign of terror then begins, and he degenerates in the falling action into a duplication of a human being. The irony of the book is that at the end, with the animals in control, things are exactly the same as at the beginning when the humans are in control.

AUTHOR'S STYLE

Orwell's style in the novel is simple, sensitive, observant, straight forward, and honest. With lucid language, he tells a simple story of animals seizing a farm for themselves and how Napoleon becomes the dictator over them. Despite the simplicity, Orwell is very graphic in his descriptions, whether it is Mollie who comes in "mincing daintily chewing at a lump of sugar" or "several men dropped their sticks and tried to run, but panic overtook them and the next moment all the animals together were chasing them round and round the yard. They were gored, kicked, bitten, trampled on."

Orwell relates the story as though he were writing history. His presentation appears factual and does not moralize, sermonize, or sit in judgment. Yet it is obvious that he finds Boxer heroic and Napoleon despicable.

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