Short Essay Lit Analysis
Animal Farm
Study Guide:
- You will choose 2 questions to respond to, I will choose 1. 3 questions total.
- You may bring one 8.5/11 inch sheet of notes to help you with your essays. No
books, no additional notes.
- Rubric for grading is on reverse side.
- You will receive a separate summative grade for all 3.
- There will be no IRL grade, but there will also be no make-up option unless you
make special arrangements with Lucie and have a valid excuse from a parent.
Potential Essay questions for Short Essay Exam
1. Lord Acton's famous quote states "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts
absolutely.” How and why is this statement applicable to the course of events in the novel?
Use text evidence to support your assertion.
2. How is Orwell’s Animal Farm an allegorical retelling of the end of feudalism and the rise
and consolidation of communism in Russia? Use text evidence to support your assertion.
3. Consider the role of alcohol in this novel. Initially Jones is described as being constantly
drunk and out of sorts. Later, despite initially proclaiming that the animals would never
consume alcohol, the pigs decide to partake. Even Moses is given some beer. What does
alcohol symbolize in this story? Use text evidence to support your assertion.
4. During the Stalinist period the Communist State repeatedly set industrial and
agricultural production goals that were often difficult or impossible to reach. These goals
played a major role in the government’s Five Year Plan and similar plans. How are these
plans represented in Orwell’s novella? Use text evidence to support your assertion.
5. Allegory is a tactic often used by authors to offer political commentary. Orwell is no
exception. His ambition as a political author was to "make political writing into an art.”
What overall message is Orwell trying to espouse through this novella?
6. What internal feud within the Communist party is paralleled in the struggle for power
between Napoleon and Snowball? Use text evidence to support your assertion.
7. Speculate on why Orwell made the reader sympathize with all the animals except the
pigs, the most intelligent beasts and the closest to humans of any of the animals. Use text
evidence to support your assertion.
8. Why don’t the pigs like the pet raven Moses’ stories about Sugarcandy Mountain? Use
text evidence to support your assertion.
9. All seven commandments are erased. What is the new commandment and how has it
been true from the beginning? Use text evidence to support your assertion.
Short Essay Lit Analysis
Animal Farm
10. At the end of the novel, as the animals watch, the pigs begin to resemble the humans.
What is significant about this moment in the novel. What message is Orwell trying to
convey here? Use text evidence to support your assertion.
RUBRIC:
Common Core
Standard
Writing 1a:
Write arguments
focused on disciplinespecific content.
Introduce precise,
knowledgeable
claims, establish
significance of claims
and create an
organization that
logically sequences
the claims and
evidence.
Exceeding
Meeting
Approaching
Beginning
Short essays argue a
clear, specific,
original thesis
directly answering
the focus question or
questions. Student
uses specific and
appropriately cited
examples from class
sources to support
their thesis.
Insightful
explanations
demonstrate
complex analysis of
events, people and
situations.
Short essays argue a
clear thesis directly
answering the focus
question. Student
uses specific
examples from class
sources to support
their thesis.
Explanations are
organized and
reasonable, showing
competent analysis
of characters and
situations.
Thesis is too general
or too specific to
argue a clear,
informed
perspective on the
question. Student
uses examples from
class sources to
support their thesis,
yet some of the
examples are overly
general, or there are
insufficient
examples to prove
the thesis.
Explanations may be
too brief, lack logical
organization or
show little analytical
reasoning.
Argument is not
expressed in a thesis
directly answering
the question.
Student does not
effectively use
examples from class
sources to focus
their response.
There are very few
examples, or the
examples are too
general be used as
evidence.
Explanations do not
demonstrate clear
reasoning in
response to the
question.