Wednesday, August 5, 2015

In Animal Farm, what are Snowball's views on education for the animals?

Snowball believes that all of the animals should try to learn to read at least a little. 


After the animals expel the humans from the farm, the pigs are in charge.  The two main factions are those of Napoleon and Snowball.  Napoleon is much more interested in gathering power to himself, but Snowball is actually interested in bettering the lives of the animals on the farm. 


Before the humans left, the animals all pretty much acted like animals.  However, the pigs are intelligent enough to use old books left on the farm to teach themselves to read.  Then it is the other animals' turn.  Some of the animals on the farm are more successful at this than others. 


Snowball is the best writer.  He tries to organize the animals into committees, which is not too productive.  He also tries to get as many animals reading as possible, even if they can only recognize the letters in their names. 



The reading and writing classes, however, were a great success. By the autumn almost every animal on the farm was literate in some degree. (Ch. 3) 



The dogs and Muriel learn to read pretty well, and Mollie learns to spell her name.  Boxer gets up to the letter “D.”  Most of the other animals do not get farther than the first letter of the alphabet. 


While Snowball tries to help the animals become literate, Napoleon has a plan of his own. 



Napoleon took no interest in Snowball's committees. He said that the education of the young was more important than anything that could be done for those who were already grown up. (Ch. 3) 



What Napoleon really does is take the puppies and train them in secret to be his guard dogs.  He is not really interested in the education of the young.  He just wants a group of fierce, loyal dogs to do his bidding and frighten the other animals into submission.

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