Animal Farm: Chapter 1
Recap learning:
1. What job did George
Orwell have in Burma?
2. What did he first
experience in Burma that
made him always side
with the working classes?
3. What war did he volunteer
to fight in?
4. For what purposes did
George Orwell write?
1.Totalitarianism
2. Dictator
a. Someone who is
guided by values and
principles
b. a short moral story
(often with animal
characters)
3. Idealist
c. a form of government
in which the ruler is an
absolute dictator
4. Allegory
d. A leader who has
sole and absolute
power
What function/job does a first chapter have?
What first impression does the reader get
of Mr Jones?
Mr. Jones, of the Manor Farm,
had locked the hen-houses for
the night,
but was too drunk to remember
to shut the pop-holes.
With the ring of light
from his lantern dancing from
side to side,
he lurched across the yard,
kicked off his boots at the back
door, drew himself a last glass of
beer from the barrel in the
scullery, and made his way up to
bed, where Mrs. Jones was
already snoring.
As you read the first chapter, pay attention
as to how characters are introduced.
Character
Old Major
Clover
Boxer
Mollie
How introduced
How do the pigs
act as they
prepare to listen
to Old Major?
What is the reader told
about the raven? What does
this suggest about the raven?
Foreshadowing: the presentation in a work of literature
of hints and clues that tip the reader off as to what
is to come later in the work. The writer gives the
reader a hint--just a shadow--of something to come
later in the story. . . . to plant clues, and to intensify
the suspense.
What predictions about characters and events
do you have?
The Power of Oratory
In chapter one, Old Major speaks eloquently to the animals.
He reminds them of the way they are exploited and repressed
by humans.
Old Major uses the power of oratory:
• to put forward his ideas and visions for the future
• to persuade his audience about the ‘truth’ of his arguments
Oratory is inspired public speaking. An orator uses techniques such as:
•Rule of three
•Rhetorical question
•Emotive language
•Hyperbole
•Repetition
•imperatives
Name of
rhetorical device
1. Rule of three
Example
a. Poor innocent creatures slaughtered
2. Rhetorical
question
b. My sister uses so much makeup, she broke a
chisel trying to get it off last night
3. Emotive
language
c. “Friends, Romans, Countrymen” – William
Shakespeare in Julius Caesar
“Blood, sweat and tears” – General Patton
Our priorities are “Education, Education,
Education” – Prime Minister, Tony Blair
4. hyperbole
d. It is vital to stay alert!
5. repetition
e. How do you solve a problem like Maria?
6. imperatives
f. Our priorities are “Education, Education,
Education” – Prime Minister, Tony Blair
Great Oratory can help overcome tyranny; it can sometimes change the
World.
‘I have dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation
where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin
but by the content of their character.’
If we look around in the world where do we see women
happy, well treated and satisfied unless where the world has been made
what women wish it to be? Men are responsible if they allow the present
condition of things to continue. Women have the power to work out their
own salvation. But as it is, if a woman is ruined, if a child is injured, man is
responsible for it all. It is a responsibility I would not care to have, and, as
thing are, I would not be a man for all the world. If women fail as men have
failed, then they will bear the burden with them. But since men cannot
protect and shield us, let us share the duty with them, let us use our power
so that women may be a participant, not to tyrannise over man but to take a
share in the responsibilities of ruling, without which there is no real
representative government. What we really are interested in in this fight is
the uplifting of the sex and better conditions of
humanity than men can secure. In the legal
home there is but the man. What we want is
the combined intelligence of man and woman
working in salvation of the children of the race.
This will make for the world a better time
than ever before in history.
We have waited too long for our freedom. We can no longer wait.
Now is the time to intensify the struggle on all fronts. To relax our efforts now
would be a mistake which generations to come will not be able to forgive. The
sight of freedom looming on the horizon should encourage us to redouble our
efforts. It is only through disciplined mass action that our victory can be assured.
We call on our white compatriots to join us in the shaping of a new South Africa.
The freedom movement is a political home for you too. We call on the
international community to continue the campaign to isolate the apartheid
regime. To lift sanctions now would be to run the risk of aborting the process
towards the complete eradication of apartheid. Our march to freedom is
irreversible. We must not allow fear to stand in our way. Universal suffrage on a
common voters' role in a united democratic and non-racial South Africa
is the only way to peace and racial harmony.
Not all orators use their power of speech for good.
‘The force which ever set in motion the great historical avalanches of
religious and political movements is the magic power of the spoken word.
The broad masses of a population are more amenable to the appeal of
rhetoric than to any other force.’ Adolf Hitler
"Now, comrades, what is the nature of this life of ours? Let us face it:
our lives are miserable, laborious, and short. We are born, we are given
just so much food as will keep the breath in our bodies, and those of us
who are capable of it are forced to work to the last atom of our strength;
and the very instant that our usefulness has come to an end we are
slaughtered with hideous cruelty. No animal in England knows the meaning
of happiness or leisure after he is a year old. No animal in England is
free. The life of an animal is misery and slavery: that is the plain truth.
"But is this simply part of the order of nature? Is it because this land
of ours is so poor that it cannot afford a decent life to those who dwell
upon it? No, comrades, a thousand times no! The soil of England is
fertile, its climate is good, it is capable of affording food in abundance
to an enormously greater number of animals than now inhabit it. This
single farm of ours would support a dozen horses, twenty cows, hundreds of
sheep--and all of them living in a comfort and a dignity that are now
almost beyond our imagining. Why then do we continue in this miserable
condition? Because nearly the whole of the produce of our labour is stolen
from us by human beings. There, comrades, is the answer to all our
problems. It is summed up in a single word--Man. Man is the only real
enemy we have. Remove Man from the scene, and the root cause of hunger and
overwork is abolished for ever.
Find examples of persuasive techniques
in Old Major’s speech. Find examples of
1. Rule of three
2. Rhetorical question
3. Emotive language
4. hyperbole
5. repetition
6. imperatives