Study Guide: Animal Farm: Study Guide

By Jude Ensaff

This study guide for the famous novel Animal Farm is full of useful information about:

• context
• plot and structure
• character
• themes
• stye
• structure
• approaching assessments
• essay questions.

Perfect for home or class study.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Chatten House
• Release date: Jul 27, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201326197

Jude Ensaff

Jude Ensaff is a prolific writer and educational leader. She has worked in education for over twenty years. She has won awards and been shortlisted in numerous writing competitions. Jude completed a Masters degree at distinction level in 2011 and continues to write and work in education to this day. She publishes material under Jude Ensaff and her full name of Najoud Ensaff.

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Copyrighted Material

First published in this format 2022

Chatten House Publishing

STUDY GUIDE

ANIMAL FARM

A guide to the famous novel by George Orwell

Text  ©  Jude Ensaff

The rights of the author have been asserted in accordance with Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988. The publisher asserts that illustrations have been used as part of fair usage or due to the date or nature of their original publication. No part of this book can be reproduced (including photocopying or storing electronically) without written permission of the copyright holders.

All Rights Reserved. 

Table of Contents

COPYRIGHT

Table of Contents

Study and revision

Approaching the text

Revising the text

Using this guide and Page references

Film and stage interpretations

Review Learning: Study and Revision

Plot and Structure

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Parallels between Animal Farm and Russian History

Structure

Key points in the novel structure Ex

Review Learning: Plot and Strcuture

Context

Orwell’s Life

Early Life

Life as a Writer

Spanish Civil War

Novel Writing

Key Political terms

The Soviet Union

Grade Comparison of the novel context with the Soviet Union

Review Learning: Context

Characterisation

Old Major (Willingdon Beauty)

Napoleon

Snowball

Squealer

Boxer

Benjamin

Mollie

Clover

The pigs

The dogs

The sheep

Mr Jones

Pilkington

Frederick

Moses

What Characters Represent

Review Learning: Characterisation

Themes

Power A key theme in the novel is power and the w

Hierarchy

Violence and Power

Knowledge and power

Language and power

Resources and power

Cruelty and abuse of power

Lies and Deception

Ideals: Utopia

Reality: Dystopia

History and Collective Memory

Review Learning: Themes

Style

Satire

Allegory

Symbolism

Fairy Tales Orwell’s original title for the nove

Animal Stories

Narrative Voice

Point of View

Dialogue

Language and Imagery

Repetition

Tone and Irony

Imagery

Propaganda:

Comedy

Review Learning:Style

Tackling the Assessments

How the novel is examined by Exam Boards If you a

Essay writing When you are responding in an exam

Essay structure Essays are made up of three secti

Developing an argument and linking paragraphs Par

Using PEE When you write a paragraph in a critica

Questions The sort of questions you will face in

Preparation and planning

Identifying key words and planning ideas Getting

Achieving a top or middle grade

Review Learning: Tackling the Assessments

Assessment Objectives and Skills

AO1

AO2

AO3

AO4

How you can prepare

What you will not gain marks

Review Learning: Assessment Objectiives and Skills

Sample Essays

Essay beginnings

Character questions

Theme questions

Other questions

Review Learning: Sample Essays

Answers

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Study and revision

What does it mean to study a text?

What does it mean to revise a text?

How can you study and revise Animal Farm?

You may be reading Animal Farm as part of your preparation for examination at GCSE or another level. Whatever the level this guide will assist you in understanding the novel and revising its main components. The Assessment section of this guide refers to GCSE examinations in the United Kingdom, namely AQA (Assessment and Qualifications Alliance), Pearsons Edexcel and OCR (Oxford, Cambridge, RSA). It does not refer to IGCSE or WJEC because at the time of writing and publication neither of these examinations or boards included Animal Farm as a set text for study and examination. 

When you study a text you read it and analyse the content in detail. This guide will assist you in reading Animal Farm, one of the landmark novels of the twentieth century, by guiding you though the following chapters:

Context

Plot and Structure

Characterisation

Themes

Style

When you revise a text you review and recap learning usually in preparation for assessment or examination. This guide will assist you in revising Animal Farm through  its Review Learning Points at the end of chapters and through the following chapters:

Tackling the Assessments

Assessment Objectives and Skills

Sample Essays

This Study and Revision chapter is divided into the following subchapters:

Approaching the text

Revising the text

Using this guide and Page references

Film and stage interpretations

Review Learning

Approaching the text

A novel is, above all, a narrative. A large part of the storyteller’s art is to make you want to find out what happens next, and therefore to keep you reading to the end. In order to study Animal Farm and to enjoy it, you need to keep a close track of the events that take place in it. This guide will help you to do that, but you may also benefit from keeping your own notes on the main events and who is involved in them.

However, any novel consists of much more than its events. You need to know the story well to get a good grade in the exam, but if you spend a lot of time simply retelling the story you will not get a high mark. You also need to keep track of a number of other features.

First, you need to take notice of the setting of the novel — where the events take place — and how this influences the story. You also need to know the characters and how Orwell lets us know what they are like. Notice how they are described, what they say and do, and what other characters say about them. Think about why they behave in the way they do — consider their motives — and what clues the writer gives us about these. Also, if you watch a film or stage adaptation of the novel, consider how characters are presented in this.

As you read on, you will notice themes: the ideas explored by the writer in the book. You may find it easier to think about these while not actually reading the novel, especially if you discuss them with other people. You should try to become aware of the style of the novel, especially on a second reading. This means how the writer presents the story. The context, background, to the book is also important.

All these aspects of the novel are dealt with in this guide. However, you should always try to notice them for yourself. This guide is no substitute for a careful and thoughtful reading of the text.

Revising the text

Animal Farm may be one of your English Literature set texts for examination at GCSE or another level and it could be one of the texts you use in a Controlled Spoken Language Assessment for English Language GCSE.

We will focus on preparation for your English Literature GCSE examination although much of the content in this guide will support any spoken language assessment you may have.  In all cases, knowing the text is essential. Making sure that you read the novel and keep good notes throughout your GCSE will help you but so too will proper revision and using this guide.

In your assessment, you will likely not be allowed to use your text, so revision is really important.

Make sure you know the novel. To achieve a top grade, re-read the text before your assessment.

It is a good idea to get the date of your exam, or Controlled Assessment well in advance so that you can plan a revision timetable in the lead up to the assessment. Give yourself plenty of time, especially if you have other subjects to revise for.

Make sure that you know key points like the fact that power is a major theme in the novel or that the character Napoleon represents Stalin in Communist Russia

Test yourself on these key points by talking about them, writing them down without your text or planning responses to some questions in timed conditions.

Using this guide

You may find it useful to read sections of this guide when you need them, rather than reading it from start to finish. For example you may find it useful to read the Plot and Structure section in conjunction with the novel itself, whether to back up your first reading of it at school or college or to help you revise.

Throughout the guide you will find the following inclusions identified by clear symbols:

Top Tips provide you with key information about the novel.

Think points are opportunities for you to think more deeply about key ideas in the novel.

Focus points are opportunities for you to consider texts or questions in detail.

Review Learning points provide you with questions to recap learning in the previous chapter. 

In the interactive version of this guide you will also find useful audio and video components which offer summaries for key ideas covered, as well as self marking questions. 

The Tackling the Assessments section will be especially useful in the weeks leading up to the exam. Remember to start to revise early — several months before your actual exam. At the end of the book you will find answers to the Review Learning questions, except for interactive books where questions are self marking.

Page references

Page references are given for the Heinemann edition of the text. For example, a reference to H56, means that a quotation appears on page 56 in the Heinemann edition of the novel.

(Please note images in this guide are credited in the captions and fall under fair usage for copyright or are in the public domain.)

Film and stage interpretations

There have been two major film adaptations of Animal Farm-one produced in 1954 and another in 1999. The first – a cartoon animation – was Britain’s first animated feature film and has received much attention as a result of this and revelations that its funding came from the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) who wanted to fund anti communist art. Whilst it is heavily reliant on narration, the 1954 film is a landmark creation and includes a noted music score by Matyas Seiber and impressive vocal talents by Maurice Denham, who single handedly provides every voice and animal noise in the film!

The fact that to coincide with the film release in 1954, a comic strip serialisation of Animal Farm was also released in newspapers and other periodicals, illustrated by Harold Whitaker- one of the animators of the film, shows how important the novel was considered at the time.

The 1999 film incorporates real actors alongside animals, aided by modern technology and digital animation. Neither film is entirely faithful to the original novel with changes to events and characters being made, so if you do watch them, take care not to get confused! Nevertheless, both films are worth viewing in order to see how events and characters have been interpreted.

Farmer Jones in the 1954 film of Animal Farm

Alongside films of the novel, play scripts and stage adaptations exist, so it would be beneficial for you to keep an eye out for any local or national companies staging a production of Animal Farm. Ian Wooldridge and Peter Hall’s play scripts of the novel offer an interesting comparison for you, and can be read quite easily alongside the original novel.

Incorporating information about film or