Lesson 4

Lesson Goals

Texts

Core

• • Animal Farm, John Stephenson, Hallmark Entertainment, 1999
  • Animal Farm, Joy Batchelor, John Halas, Halas and Batchelor, 1954

Optional

• • Animal Farm, George Orwell and Chris Mould, Faber & Faber, 2021

Materials

Tools

• Animal Farm: History of Visual Interpretations

• Animal Farm: Reading Schedule

• Video Note-Taking Tool

Question Sets

• Animal Farm: Section 3 Question Set

Editable Google Docs

• Animal Farm: Section 3 Question Set

• Video Note-Taking Tool

Activity 1: Discuss

In expert discussion groups, we will share the research we have done about a visual interpretation of Animal Farm. We will then form a group claim about the interpretation.

Step 1

Join an expert team with other students who have researched the same visual interpretation of Animal Farm as you.

Share the summary of your research you wrote (for Lesson 1 homework), using these questions to organize your presentation:

1. What have you learned about the visual interpretation, its creator, and its purpose?

2. What resources did you locate and use to inform your understanding and analysis?

3. How would you describe or characterize the images used in the visual interpretation?

4. How do those images compare to the Halas and Batchelor images from the 1954 movie and illustrated edition?

5. How do the images compare to your own visualization of the characters and scenes?

6. What messages do you think the creators were trying to convey through their visual interpretation?

7. How do those messages relate or compare to the themes Orwell conveys through his writing?

8. Which images of your character do you find interesting? How might you include these images in your image bank and potentially in your own visual interpretation of the story?

Step 2

Discuss and compare your summaries, and develop a group summary claim in response to this question:

9. In what ways do you find (or not find) the visual interpretation to be interesting, compelling, and consistent with Orwell’s allegory?

Discuss your claim and the evidence that supports it so that every member of your team is prepared to share and explain it to other students in a jigsaw discussion.

Activity 2: View – Discuss

We will join a new home group and share the claims we have developed about a selected visual interpretation of Animal Farm.

Join a new jigsaw home discussion group with students who have researched and discussed other visual interpretations of Animal Farm.

Identify the interpretation you examined and share the claims you developed in your expert discussion teams in response to this question:

1. In what ways do you find (or not find) the visual interpretation to be interesting, compelling, and consistent with Orwell’s allegory?

As you present and discuss your claims, refer to supporting information from the interpretive summaries you wrote based on your research about the visual interpretation.

Compare the various interpretations of the book that have been developed by illustrators, artists, and movie makers over time, and discuss what they suggest about the different meanings readers might find in the narrative.

Activity 3: View – Discuss

We will watch selected scenes from the 1999 animated movie of Animal Farm, focusing on the movie’s narrative structure and its first-person narrator, key scenes, and characters. We will compare the more recent movie to the 1954 version and to Orwell’s written narrative.

Step 1

As directed by your teacher, access and watch scenes from the 1999 Hallmark TV movie of Animal Farm, directed by John Stephenson, which uses real animal figures animated by Jim Henson’s Creature Shop to present a different version of the story.

Take and make notes about what you observe and think as you watch.

As you watch, pause at key scenes and discuss how those scenes compare to what occurs in the book.

Step 2

Begin by watching the opening scene of the movie and the early scene in which Old Major begins his speech to the animals.

Consider these questions as you discuss how the narrative structure in the movie is already quite different from the book:

1. What is the setting of the opening scene? How does the setting (with its intense storm) create a dark mood for the opening of the story?

2. What do you soon learn about when the opening scene is occurring, relative to the storyline of Orwell’s book?

3. Which character is narrating the story? How does this character’s first-person narration differ from the way you experience the story as written and narrated by Orwell?

4. How does what the movie makers have chosen to do in telling the story from a character’s point of view relate to what you have done in your own written interpretation?

Step 3

Return to the concepts of flashback and narrative point of view that you discussed at the start of this unit. Discuss these related questions:

5. How does the use of a flashback at the start of the movie change the way you think about the story?

6. What might the stormy future scene narrated by Jessie foreshadow?

7. In the book, Jessie the dog is a very minor character. How might elevating her by having her tell the story change it?

Step 4

Watch additional key scenes from the movie, as selected by your teacher.

As you view and compare scenes and characters, consider these questions:

8. What happens in the scene, and which characters does it involve?

9. What part of the book does the scene correspond to?

10. In what ways is the movie’s presentation of the scene similar to or different from the book’s storyline?

11. What is similar and different about how the characters are depicted and interact?

12. How does the 1999 movie’s presentation of scenes and characters compare to Halas and Batchelor’s 1954 animation?

13. How does the movie’s presentation of scenes and characters compare to your own visualization of them?

Step 5

Watch the key scenes that end the movie, presenting, in order:

• Benjamin reading the final revision of the Commandments to the other animals

• Squealer introducing a grainy newsreel that pays tribute to Napoleon

• A return to the (future) storm that began the movie, followed by Jessie’s narration of its “happy ending”

Discuss these questions:

14. What do the ending scenes of the newsreel tribute followed by the destruction of the farm suggest about Napoleon’s reign and the final fate of the farm under his rule?

15. How do the mood of the final scene as narrated by Jessie and the happy ending of the “new owners” listening to the song “Blueberry Hill” contrast with the rest of the movie and present a very different resolution to the story?

Step 6

Compare the endings and final scenes of the book, the 1954 Halas and Batchelor movie, and the 1999 Stevenson movie.

16. What words would you use to describe the very different moods of the final moments of each of the presentations of Animal Farm:

• Book: the blurring of the distinctions between the pigs and the men

• 1954 movie: Benjamin leading the united animals to overthrow Napoleon

• 1999 movie: Jessie’s return to the farm and narration about the new owners

17. How do the final messages and meanings of the three different versions of the story compare? Which version seems to be the best ending of the story to you?

Activity 4: Discuss – Write

We will discuss how and why the themes and messages conveyed by the two movies are different from those presented by Orwell in the book.

Step 1

Discuss the key differences you have noted between the two movies and the book, focusing on:

• the narration of the story

• the sequence of the plot

• the presentation and role of key characters (e.g., Jessie, Boxer, Benjamin, others)

• the interpretation of key scenes you have watched

Develop a theory explaining why you think the two movies might be intentionally different from the book.

Step 2

Return to the claims you made about the meaning of Orwell’s allegory, which you first formed in Section 1 as you read the book and then re-formed in Section 2 after you learned about the historical context in which Orwell wrote Animal Farm.

Review and discuss the conclusions you have reached about the meaning of the story—especially in light of what happens in Chapter 10 as the story reaches its resolution.

Step 3

Now consider what happens at the end of each of the movies and how it presents a very different resolution to the story.

Based on the endings (and other differences you have noted), discuss how the meaning conveyed by the movies may be very different from the meaning Orwell intended, considering these questions:

1. In what ways does the movie reflect or alter the meaning of Animal Farm’s allegory, as written and conveyed by George Orwell?

2. Why might the producers and directors of the movie have chosen to tell and end the story differently from Orwell’s narrative?

Activity 5: View – Discuss

We will examine another recent interpretation of Animal Farm illustrated by british artist Chris Mould, noting how characters and scenes from the exposition of Orwell’s story have been depicted in black and white drawings.

Step 1

As directed by your teacher, access yet another visual interpretation of Animal Farm: a 2021 Faber and Faber Children’s edition illustrated by British artist Chris Mould.

Examine the publisher’s extract of Chapter 1, which includes illustrations of:

• the farm’s name change from “manor” to “animal” farm (publisher’s note)

• a two-page landscape of the farm (title page)

• Napoleon (page 1)

• the animals gathering for Old Major’s speech (page 4)

• a two-page rendering of the animals listening to Old Major (pages 6-7)

• four rats (page 10)

• the words of “Beasts of England” (pages 12-13)

• the animals first singing the anthem (page 14)

Step 2

Note key details of Mould’s illustrations and describe how they depict characters and scenes from the story.

Compare the feeling and mood of Mould’s illustrations to other visual interpretations you have studied, particularly the two movie versions or Ralph Steadman’s images.

If your animal character is depicted, think about how Mould’s illustration compares to your own and others’ visual interpretations.

Consider adding one or more of Mould’s images to the image bank you have been compiling for your character—and what it might mean to use one of his images on a book cover.

Activity 6: Write

We will select one visual interpretation of Animal Farm that we find to be interesting and develop a claim about how the interpretation presents or diverges from Orwell’s allegory. We will write a short response stating and defending a claim in which we relate the visual interpretation to our own, evolving understanding of the allegory.

Step 1

Review the various visual interpretations of Animal Farm that you have now examined, including (potentially):

1. The 1954 animated movie and illustrated edition created by Halas and Batchelor (Lessons 1-2)

2. The 1995 50th Anniversary edition, illustrated by Ralph Steadman (Lesson 3)

3. A visual interpretation that you have researched, summarized, and formed a group claim about (Lessons 1-4)

4. The 1999 TV movie directed by John Stephenson and animated by Jim Henson (Lesson 4)

5. The 2021 Faber Children’s edition illustrated by Chris Mould (Lesson 4)

Determine which of the interpretations you find most interesting and consistent with your own developing understanding of Orwell’s allegory and why.

With a discussion partner, explain which interpretation you have found to be most interesting and relevant, and why.

Step 2

Using details from the visual interpretation you select, form an evidence-based claim in response to these questions:

1. What is interesting or notable about how the artist has interpreted Orwell’s allegory?

2. In what ways does the visual interpretation align with, alter, or enrich your own interpretation of the allegory?

Step 3

Review the previous claims you formed in Sections 1 and 2 about the meaning of the allegory and your character’s role in it. Think about how the visual interpretation you have selected as most interesting relates to or has altered or expanded your own interpretation.

Write 1-2 paragraphs that explain and support your claim about the selected visual interpretation and how it presents Orwell’s allegory.

Discuss the meaning inherent in the interpretation and how that meaning relates to Orwell’s themes and to your own developing understanding of the book.