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Chapter 1: Mr Jonses, owner of the Manor Farm, went to bed without shutting the pop-holes, because he was too drunk to remember to do so. As soon as he was out of the way, the animals of the farm met in the big barn, because Old Major, the white boar, had something to tell them and he was so regarded in the farm that everyone was quite ready to lose and hour in order to hear what he had to say. First came the three dogs, then the pigs. At this point, there is a description of every animal or group of animals of the farm. As soon as all the animals, except the tame raven Moses, who was sleeping, had arrived, Old Major began to speak, saying that, before telling his dream, he will talk about something else. He said that animals in England had miserable and short lives and that the only reason of their slavery and misery was man. In fact the soil of England could feed all animals properly, but the products of their work were stolen them by man, the only creature that consumes without producing. Without man, animals would be free, happy and the produce of their labour would be their own. Therefore, Napoleon’s message to his comrades is to rebel against man and overthrow his tyranny. At this point, there was a tremendous uproar and then the animals put to the vote if rats and rabbits were comrades and it was agreed that they were. The animals later decided that what went upon two legs was an enemy and what went upon four legs, or had wings, was a friend. Napoleon invites his comrades not to adopt man’s vices, not therefore to live in a house, or wear clothes, or drink alcohol, or smoke and especially not to tyrannize over his own kind. Then he talks about his dream of the earth as it would be when man had vanished and it reminded him of a song he knew when he was little, called “beasts of England”. He sang it to other animals and they were thrown into the wildest excitement. They sang the song many times and the uproar awoke Mr. Jones, who seized the gun and shot into the darkness, scaring the animals, that fled to their sleeping-place and in a moment the farm was asleep again.

Chapter 2: Old Major died but his speech had given to the more intelligent animals on the farm a completely new outlook on life. The work of teaching and organizing the others fell upon the pigs, because they were the cleverest of all, and among them preeminent were Snowball and Napoleon. They, together with Squealer, another one of the pigs, elaborated the Animalism, a system of thought based on old Major’s ideas. In expounding its principles to their comrades, at first they met with stupidity and apathy and they had a struggle to counteract the lies put about by Moses, the tame raven, who claimed to know of the existence of a mysterious and fantastic land called sugarcandy mountain, to which all animals went when they died. The pigs’ most faithful disciples were the two carthorses, Boxer and Clover, who absorbed everything they were told and passed it on to the other animals. At last, the rebellion occurred earlier than anyone expected, because Mr. Jones had become disheartened and had taken to drinking too much. Plus, his men were evil, so the farm was neglected and the animals were underfed. On midsummer’s eve Mr. Jones went out and got so drunk that he didn’t come back until the next day and in the meanwhile his men didn’t feed the animals, which eventually began the rebellion. They attacked Mr. Jones’ men and, when the farmer saw what was happening, he slipped out of the farm. After the rebellion had been successfully carried through, the animals’ first act was to gallop in a body right round the boundaries of the farm, to make sure that no man was hiding somewhere; then they returned to the farm and destroyed everything that reminded them of Mr. Jones. The next day the animals woke up at dawn as usual and realized what had happened and that the farm was all theirs. They went inside the farmhouse and then voted that it should be preserved as a museum. After breakfast, Snowball and Napoleon called the animals together and revealed them that they had taught themselves to write and read. Snowball, who was the best at writing, painted out “Manor Farm” from the top bar of the gate and in its place painted “Animal Farm”. Then Snowball and Napoleon explained how the pigs had succeeded in reducing the principles of Animalism to 7 commandments, and Snowball read them to the others, who nodded in agreement. At this point, the cows lowed loudly because they hadn’t been milked for a whole day. So the pigs milked them, the animals went to the hayfield to begin the harvest and, when they returned, they found out that the milk had disappeared.

Chapter 3: The harvest was a great success; the animals were even faster than the humans were, even though they cannot use the implements designed for men. The pigs did not actually work, but directed and supervised the others. This was the biggest harvest the farm had ever seen; there was no wastage and finally the food was truly their own. Without the humans, there was more for everyone to eat and there was more leisure too. Animals faced many difficulties, but the pigs’ cleverness and Boxer’s muscles always pulled them through. He was tireless, but everyone worked according to his capacity: nobody stole, nobody grumbled over his rations and there were no more quarreling or jealousy. Nobody shirked, except for the cat, which disappeared every time there was work to be done; as for the donkey, he did his work as in Jones’s time, nerve shirking neither volunteering for extra work. Sunday was the rest day and, after breakfast, there was the hoisting of the flag. Then the meeting took place: here the work of the week was planned out and resolutions were put forward and debated. The resolutions were always put forward by the pigs and the most active in the debates were Snowball and Napoleon, but they were never in agreement. Snowball organized the other animals into Animal Committees, but, overall, these projects were a failure. Successful were instead the reading and writing classes. The pigs could already read and write perfectly and, by the autumn, almost every animal on the farm was literate in some degree.

It was found then that the stupider animals, such as the sheep, could not learn the seven commandments by heart and so Snowball reduced them to the maxim “four legs good, two legs bad”. It was inscribed on the end wall of the barn, above the seven commandments. The sheep developed a great liking for this maxim and often they start bleating it. Napoleon, on the other hand, took no interest in these committees, since he thought that the education of the young was more important. In fact, when Jessie and Bluebell gave birth to their puppies, Napoleon immediately took them away and kept them in such seclusion that the rest of the farm soon forgot their existence. As for the mystery of the milk, it was found out that it was mixed everyday into the pigs’ mash and they claimed for themselves the use of the windfall apples. Even Snowball and Napoleon agreed on this point. Squealer explained that this was to preserve the pigs’ health, since they’re brainworkers. Plus, if not well fed the pigs would fail in their duty, causing so Mr. Jones’s comeback and, if there was one thing the animals were completely certain of, it was that they did not want Jones back. So it was agreed with no argument that the milk and windfall apples should be reserved for the pigs alone.

Chapter 4: Every day Snowball and Napoleon sent pigeons to the neighboring farms to tell them the story of the rebellion and teach them Beasts of England. Mr. Jones complained to anyone of his troubles and the other farmers didn’t help him very much, because they wanted to try to turn Jones’s misfortune to their own advantage. Then the two neighboring farms, Foxwood and Pinchfield, owned respectively by Mr. Pilkington and Mr. Frederick, are described: the first one was big but overgrown by woodland and in disgraceful conditions, while the other is smaller but well kept. At first, the situation of the farm was taken lightly and these two farmers thought that the animals would have quarreled and eventually starved to death. This actually didn’t occur and so the farmers realized that the animals were a real threat and began to talk about the wickedness that flourished on animal farm, but their stories were never fully believed and throughout a year a lot of animals rebelled. Plus, the song Beasts of England was now known everywhere, despite the humans’ attempts to prevent the animals from learning and singing it. On an October day, Jones and all his men, together with others from Pinchfield and Foxwood, attempted the recapture of the farm, which the animals had actually long expected and so all the preparations had been already made. Snowball had studied a book of Julius Caesar’s campaigns and elaborated a complex strategy. Through a series of attacks, he made the men believe they had won, luring them well inside the yard, where the real offensive occurred. The humans ran away, all except one, who in fact was dead. Boxer found him and he’s sad because of what he’s not intentionally done, but Snowball blamed him and said that the only good human being was a dead one. The animals then celebrated their victory by running up the flag and singing Beasts of England. They gave a solemn funeral to a dead sheep and they decided to create two military decorations, one for Snowball and Boxer, who had been bold during the battle, and one for the dead sheep. The animals named this fight the battle of the Cowshed and decided to keep Mr. Jones’s gun and to fire it twice a year, on the anniversary of the battle and on the one of the rebellion.

Chapter 5: Winter came, and Mollie worked less and less. Eventually, Clover discovered that Mollie was being bribed off Animal Farm by one of Pilkington's men, who eventually won her loyalties. Mollie disappeared, and the pigeons reported seeing her standing outside a pub, sporting one of the ribbons that she always coveted. The pigs increased their influence on the farm, deciding all questions of policy and then offering their decisions to the animals, who must ratify them by a majority vote. However, Snowball and Napoleon continued their fervent debates and disagreed at every point where disagreement was possible. At the meetings, Snowball often won over the majority by his brilliant speeches, but Napoleon was better at canvassing support for himself in between times and he was especially successful with the sheep. The greatest of their debates occurred over the building of a windmill on a knoll. Snowball argued in favor of the windmill, which he was certain would eventually become a labor-saving device (it in fact would have for example supplied the farm with electrical power); Napoleon argued against it, saying that building the windmill would have taken time and effort away from the more important task of producing food. Benjamin was the only animal who didn’t side with either faction. He didn’t believe either that the food would become more plentiful or that the windmill would save work, ‘cause, with or without it, life would go on as it had always gone on, that is badly. Snowball and Napoleon also disagreed on whether they should (as Napoleon thought) amass an armory of guns or (as Snowball thought) send out more pigeons to neighboring farms to spread news of the rebellion. The animals listened first to Napoleon, then to Snowball, and could not decide which was right, always agreeing with the one who was speaking at that moment. On the Sunday that the plan for the windmill was to be put to a vote, Snowball’s eloquence carried the animals away, so that by the time he had finished speaking they didn’t have a doubt about who they would vote for. But at this point Napoleon called out nine ferocious dogs (those puppies he had taken away in order to rear them privately), who chased Snowball off the farm. Napoleon then announced that all debates would have stopped: in future all questions related to the working of the farm would be settled by a special committee of pigs, presided over by himself. The animals were dismayed by this announcement; someone tried to express their disapproval, but Napoleon’s dogs silenced them. Afterwards Squealer was sent to explain the new arrangements to the others and said that Napoleon had to take decisions for all the animals; in fact they might have taken the wrong decisions, causing so Mr Jones’s return, which none of the animals wanted. Boxer was persuaded by this speech and he adopted the maxim “Napoleon is always right”.

Three weeks after Snowball's escape, Napoleon surprised everybody by announcing that the windmill would be built. He sent Squealer to the animals to explain that the windmill was really Napoleon's idea all along and that the plans for it were stolen from him by Snowball.

Chapter 6: During the following year, the animals work harder than ever before. Building the windmill is a laborious business, and Boxer proves himself a model of physical strength and dedication. Napoleon announces that Animal Farm will begin trading with neighboring farms and hires Mr. Whymper, a solicitor, to act as his agent. Other humans meet in pubs and discuss their theories that the windmill will collapse and that Animal Farm will go bankrupt. Jones gives up his attempts at retaking his farm and moves to another part of the county. The pigs move into the farmhouse and begin sleeping in beds, which Squealer excuses on the grounds that the pigs need their rest after the daily strain of running the farm. That November, a storm topples the half-finished windmill. Napoleon tells the animals that Snowball is responsible for its ruin and offers a reward to any animal who kills Snowball or brings him back alive. Napoleon then declares that they will begin rebuilding the windmill that very morning.

Chapter 7: As the human world watches Animal Farm and waits for news of its failure, the animals struggle against starvation. Napoleon uses Mr. Whymper to spread news of Animal Farm's sufficiency to the human world. After learning that they must surrender their eggs, the hens stage a demonstration that only ends when they can no longer live without the rations that Napoleon had denied them. Nine hens die as a result of the protest. The animals are led to believe that Snowball is visiting the farm at night and spitefully subverting their labor. He becomes a constant (and imagined) threat to the animals' security, and Squealer eventually tells the animals that Snowball has sold himself to Frederick and that he was in league with Jones from the very beginning. One day in spring, Napoleon calls a meeting of all the animals, during which he forces confessions from all those who had questioned him (such as the four pigs in Chapters 5 and 6 and the three hens who lead the protest) and then has them murdered by the dogs. Numerous animals also confess to crimes that they claim were instigated by Snowball. Eventually, the singing of "Beasts of England" is outlawed and a new song by Minimus, Napoleon's pig-poet, is instituted, although the animals do not find the song as meaningful as their previous anthem....