Animal Farm Chapter 1 Summary

Animal Farm Chapter 1 Summary

Animal Farm by George Orwell

Setting

Chapter 1 of animal farm is set in Manor Farm

Main Characters

Old Major- he is an old white boar that gives the other animals inspiration for a revolution.

Mr. Jones- he is the original owner of an animal farm and a heavy drinker.

Boxer- he is a loyal and dedicated horse but quite naïve and gullible.

Benjamin- he is one of the oldest and wisest animals on the farm and among the few who can read properly.

Mollie – he is a vain, white horse who, prior to the rebellion, pulls Mr. Jones’s cart.

Muriel – he is A white goat; one of the few animals who become fully literate.

Clover – she is A gentle, motherly, and powerful carthorse.

Plot Summary

The owner of Manor Farm, Mr. Jones, locks his henhouses for the evening but he is too drunk to remember to shut everything before he goes to bed. As soon as the lights are off in the farmhouse, the animals all stir and make their way to the big barn, where the old boar, Old Major, wants to address everyone. Old Major lies on a raised platform. The three dogs and all the pigs come in first and settle right in front of the platform. The hens and pigeons perch in windows and the rafters; the sheep and cows settle behind the pigs; and Boxer and Clover, the carthorses, lie down in the back. Clover settles a brood of orphaned ducklings in the crook of her leg as the cantankerous old donkey, Benjamin, and the goat Muriel join the horses.

The foolish mare Mollie shakes her braided and beribboned mane while she munches sugar, and the cat finds the warmest spot between Boxer and Clover. The cat does not listen to Old Major at all. Seeing that everyone but old Moses, the tame raven, is present, Old Major begins. He addresses everyone as "comrades” and announces that he is going to die soon but wants to share his wisdom and a dream he had with everyone before he does. He says that the nature of their lives is horrendous: they only get enough food to keep them going, and once they are no longer useful, Mr. Jones kills them. Animals, he insists, are slaves, though they do not have to be. Manor Farm would support many animals comfortably if only humans did not steal the products of their labor. If they remove men, they will not be hungry or overworked.

Old Major insists that humans are the only creatures who consume without producing anything, like milk or eggs. He asks the animals to consider all they have given up, from gallons of milk to hundreds of eggs to Clover’s four foals, gone forever. Old Major points out that Mr. Jones butcher's pigs will someday sell Boxer to the glue factory when he cannot work and drowns dogs when they get too old. Man, Old Major suggests, is the root of all evil. Getting rid of men through rebellion would free the animals, and Old Major insists that the rebellion will come in due course. He warns everyone that they cannot entertain the idea that humans and animals have common interests; they must believe that all men are enemies and all animals are comrades.

Suddenly, the dogs catch sight of four rats listening in and chase them back to their holes. Old Major calls for silence and insists that they must vote on whether wild animals are enemies or comrades. The assembly votes overwhelmingly in favor of wild animals being comrades. Only the cat and the dogs vote no, but some discover later that the cat voted on both sides. Solemnly, Old Major insists again that they cannot forget that man is their enemy, but they also cannot ever come to resemble man by drinking alcohol, sleeping in beds, or trading. He also says that animals cannot terrorize each other, as they are all equal.

Old Major explains that he is going to teach everyone a song that his mother taught him part of long ago. It is called "Beasts of England” and it speaks of a "golden future time” in which animals will be free from human tyranny. All the animals, both the highly intelligent and the less intelligent, learn it quickly and they sing it all together five times through. They only stop when Mr. Jones shoots his gun into the side of the barn, breaking up the meeting.

Themes

1. Class warfare. One of the main ideologies of Animalism, the ideology that Napoleon and Snowball develop, is that all animals are equal. However, it does not take long for the pigs to begin to refer to themselves as "mind workers” to distinguish themselves from the other animals, who work as physical laborers. Through this, Animal Farm shows how differences in education and occupation lead to the development of a class hierarchy, which leads inevitably to class warfare, in which one class seeks to dominate the other.
2. Revolution and corruption. Animal Farm depicts a revolution in progress. Like all popular revolutions, the uprising in Animal Farm develops out of a hope for a better future, in which farm animals can enjoy the fruits of their own labor without the overbearing rule of humans. At the time of the revolution, all of the animals on Mr. Jones’s farm, even the pigs, are committed to the idea of universal equality but these high ideals that fueled the revolution in the first place gradually give way to individual and class-based self-interest. Animal Farm thus illustrates how a revolution can be corrupted into a totalitarian regime through slow, gradual changes.