English Literature books summary

to harm".

Chapter Eight: Summary

The animals discover that after the executions, another commandment is

different from how they remembered it; the Sixth Commandment now reads "No

animal shall kill another animal without cause". Napoleon has a long poem

praising his leadership painted on the side of the barn, and it is

announced that the gun will be fired each year on his birthday. All orders

are delivered through Squealer, with Napoleon living in near seclusion in

the farmhouse and rarely appearing on the farm in person. When he does make

public appearances, it is only while accompanied by a retinue of dogs and

other servants. Napoleon announces the sale of the pile of timber to

Frederick, a neighboring farmer whose acts of cruelty toward his animals

are legendary. After the transaction, it is revealed the Frederick paid

with forged bank notes. Napoleon pronounces a death sentence onto

Frederick. Shortly thereafter, the farm is again attacked by neighboring

farmers, led by Frederick himself. Napoleon appeals to Pilkington to help

the cause of Animal Farm, but Pilkington's interest in the farm were only

economic, and since he did not get the pile of timber, he refuses to help,

sending Napoleon the message "Serves you right". The animals finally repel

the farmers, but only with great difficulty, with Boxer sustaining a severe

injury to his hoof and the windmill being destroyed in an explosion.

Napoleon celebrates the victory by drinking lots of whisky, and despite his

vicious hangover, the Fifth Commandment soon reads "No animal shall drink

alcohol in excess".

Chapter Nine: Summary

More and more, the animals begin to think about the generous

retirement plans that had been part of the ideology of the early

Revolution. Life is hard for the animals, and rations continue to be

reduced, except for the pigs, who are allowed to wear green ribbons on

Sundays, drink beer daily, and actually seem to be gaining weight. To keep

the animals from complaining about the obvious discrepancies, Squealer

continually reads the animals reports which detail how much better off they

are now then before the Revolution. Animal Farm is declared a Republic and

must elect a President. Napoleon is the only candidate and is elected

unanimously. Moses the raven returns after an absence of several years,

still talking about the mystical Sugarcandy Mountain. Boxer falls ill and

Napoleon promises to send him to a hospital, but the animals read the sign

of the truck as he is hauled away and discover that he is being taken to

the butcher's. Squealer eventually convinces the animals that they are

mistaken.

Chapter Ten: Summary

Years pass, and many of the older animals, who remember life before

the Revolution, die off. Only cynical Benjamin remains just as he always

was. The animal population has increased, but not as much as would have

been predicted at the Revolution's beginning. Talk of retirement for the

animals stops, and the pigs, who have become the largest group of animals

by far, form a bureaucratic class in the government. As Napoleon ages,

Squealer assumes a position of increasing power, and learns to walk

upright. He teaches the sheep to change their chant to "Four legs good, two

legs better," and the Seven Commandments are replaced with a single

commandment: "All animals are created equal, but some animals are more

equal than others". The animals are once again uneasy by the new political

developments, but they comfort themselves with the knowledge that at least

they have no human master. Squealer begins to seek out the approval of the

neighboring farmers for his efficiency and order at Animal Farm. The pigs

invite a group of townsmen to dinner to inspect the efficiency of Animal

Farm, and the men congratulate the pigs on their achievements, noting that

the animals at Animal Farm did more work and required less food than any

farm in the county. Napoleon refers to the farm animals as "the lower

classes" and announces that Animal Farm will take back its original name of

The Manor Farm. As the animal watch the dinner proceedings through the

window, they realize with horror that they can no longer tell the pigs'

faces from the human ones.

Childe Harold by G.G.Byron

Canto 1: A wayward, wild, immoral youth grows weary of his ways and seeks

to gain a surer foothold on life by traveling. A rambling account follows

in which Harold goes to Spain and Portugal, with momentary lapses where

other areas of Europe are recalled. Familiarity with the area in the reader

might make the descriptions more meaningful, but they are romantic

nevertheless.

Canto 2: Harold then journeys to the Baltics, where he is impressed by the

fierce culture of the Albanians, and the past glory of Greece. A

reminiscence and some extensive notes on the state of Greece and its

bondage to foreign powers are included. The descriptions are often

picturesque, but the poem as a whole lacks coherence. We see no growth in

Harold-- in fact, it is not a story about him at all, but rather a poetic

chronicle of travels and thoughts. As such, though, it is passable.

Canto 3: This is a far superior piece of work to the last two cantos.

Harold develops, affected by and reflecting deeply and interestingly on

Waterloo and Napoleon in Belgium, on the Alps, the Rhine and the battles

fought there. His cynicism begins to soften, and he begins to yearn for his

beloved. With the place-descriptions are woven (this time, rather than

simply interspersed as before) meditations on people, such as the Aventian

princess Julia whose love for her father affected Byron so deeply; and

Rousseau, of whom Byron is critical but admiring (see also his long

thoughtful note on this subject); and Voltaire and Gibbon, who are

acknowledged but claimed to be wrongheaded. Also, he thinks about nature as

a respite from the "madding crowd" (fortified with a prose argument in a

note), entertains what we would now call some "environmentalist" thoughts,

and finally comments on his shunning of the world's trends and his sorrow

as an estranged father to his girl. This canto is very like the meandering

thoughts of a traveler or a wanderer. But here they are fruitful and bubble

forth to a greater extent than in the first two.

Canto 4: In keeping with the progression of this poem, this canto is the

best of the four. In Italy, we see the places and hear reminiscences of the

people, but these in this canto seem oddly secondary. Harold's journey is

now admitted to be Byron's journey, and the meditations which the sites and

scenes inspire are deep and thoughtful as never before. We get much more of

an idea that this is Byron speaking to us rather than an imagined

character; indeed, Byron in the prefatory letter calls the work his most

thoughtful composition (as of 1818). He reaches highs of contemplation more

than once-- on imagination and the eternal glimpses it brings; on suffering

and painful memory; on solitude and its virtues and vices; on education; on

man's humility and state of political and spiritual slavery; on freedom; on

our poor souls and the illusory nature of love; on thought and truth; on

the joys of the wilderness and the power of the ocean; and an excellent

conclusion which humbly and thoughtfully closes the mind's eye of the

reader in rest. Meanwhile, of course, we are shown Venice, several ancient

sites, and (for the bulk of the canto) Rome, about whose history Byron

muses, talking of the rise and fall of civilizations. We see the Pantheon,

Circus, Coliseum, Vatican... and all inspire thought and reflection. No

real conclusions are reached-- Harold/Byron does not have a sustained and

rejuvenation epiphany-- but still we get the idea that he is better for

having superfluity wrung from him on this trip. For, how can one descend to

the level of a profligate again, after tasting the greatness which man has

attained in a worldly sense, and being inspired by that to think (to some

extent at least) of great things in a spiritual sense?

The French Lieutenant's Woman by J.Fowles

The first chapter describes Lyme Regis and its Cobb, a harbor quay on

which three characters are standing: Charles Smithson, Ernestina Freeman,

and Sarah Woodruff. The describing narrator has a distinctive voice, all-

knowing yet intimate, with a wide-ranging vocabulary and evidently vast

knowledge of political and geographical history. In one sentence the

narrator sounds like a Victorian, as he remarks that the male character

recently "had severely reduced his dundrearies, which the arbiters of the

best English male fashion had declared a shade vulgar--that is, risible to

the foreigner--a year or two previously." In the next sentence he sounds

modern, as he describes how "the colors of the young lady's clothes would

strike us today as distinctly strident." The narrator's double vision and

double voice make him as important as the characters in this novel.

Charles is a middle-aged bachelor and amateur paleontologist;

Ernestina is his fiancйe, who has brought him to spend a few days with her

aunt. Out of a chivalric concern for Sarah, Charles advises her to return

from the end of the Cobb to a safer position, but she merely stares at him.

As he reflects on this curious meeting, the narrator begins to comment on

Charles's outlook on life and on the attitudes that were typical of the age

in 1867, with occasional comparisons with 1967.

Ernestina is revealed to be a pretty but conventional young woman.

Sarah is an outcast who is reputed to be pining for the French lieutenant

who has jilted her. Charles is earnest but intelligent enough to be aware

of Ernestina's limitations. When he is looking for fossils along the wooded

Undercliff, Charles discovers Sarah sleeping, and must apologize when she

awakes and sees him observing her. As he returns to Lyme, he inquires about

her at a nearby farm, whose owner tells him that the "French Loot'n'nt's

Hoer" often walks that way. Sarah's employer, having separately become

aware of that fact, forbids her to walk there any more. Sarah spends that

night contemplating suicide, and Chapter 12 ends with two questions: "Who

is Sarah? Out of what shadows does she come?"

Chapter 13 begins "I do not know," and the narrator proceeds to

discuss the difficulty of writing a story when characters behave

independently rather than do his bidding. Charles, he complains, did not

return to Lyme as the narrator had intended but willfully went down to the

Dairy to ask about Sarah. But, the narrator concedes, times have changed,

and the traditional novel is out of fashion, according to some. Novels may

seem more real if the characters do not behave like marionettes and

narrators do not behave like God. So the narrator, in effect, promises to

give his characters the free will that people would want a deity to grant

them. Likewise, the narrator will candidly admit to the artifice of the

narration and will thereby treat his readers as intelligent, independent

beings who deserve more than the manipulative illusions of reality provided

in a traditional novel.

Subsequent chapters contain representations of domestic life--a quiet

evening with Charles and Ernestina, a morning with Charles and his valet, a

concert at the Assembly Rooms. During this last, Charles reflects on where

his life seems to be leading and on the fact that, as he puts it, he has

become "a little obsessed with Sarah…or at any rate with the enigma she

presented." He returns to the Undercliff, again finds Sarah there, and is

shocked to be told by her that she is not pining for her French lieutenant,

that he is married. The next time Charles encounters her in the Undercliff

she offers Charles some fossils she has found and tells him that she thinks

she may be going mad; she asks him to meet her there once more, when she

has more time, so that she can tell him the truth about her situation and

obtain his advice.

Charles decides to seek advice himself and visits Dr. Grogan, an

elderly bachelor and an admirer of Darwin, whose theories they discuss.

When the conversation turns to Sarah, Grogan expresses the belief that she

wants to be a victim. Sarah seems to bear out his view when she explains to

Charles that she indeed became infatuated with the French lieutenant when

he was recovering from an injury in the house, where Sarah was governess,

and that she followed him when he left to return to France. She tells

Charles that she quickly realized that he had regarded her only as an

amusement, but that she "gave" herself to him nonetheless, doubly

dishonoring herself by choice as well as by circumstances. She seems to be

proud of her status as outcast, for it differentiates her from a society

she considers unjust. Charles accepts her story--even finds it fascinating.

When Charles returns to his room at the inn, he finds a telegram from

his bachelor uncle Robert, summoning him home to the family estate he is in

line to inherit. To Charles's surprise, Robert has decided to marry Bella

Tomkins, a young widow, whose sons--if she has any--would displace Charles

as heir. On Charles's return to Lyme Regis, Ernestina mentions that Sarah

was seen returning from their last meeting in the Undercliff, where she had

been forbidden to walk, and has been dismissed by Mrs. Poulteney. At his

hotel, Charles finds a message from Sarah, urging him to meet her one more

time. Charles has Dr. Grogan call off the search for Sarah, who, it was

thought, might have killed herself Grogan again warns Charles against

Sarah, this time by offering him a document to read about a case of bizarre

behavior by a young woman in France who manages to get one of her father's

officers unjustly convicted of attempting to rape her. Charles decides to

meet Sarah again, despite the possibility that she may be deranged and

trying to destroy him.

When he finds her, she confesses that she deliberately allowed herself

to be seen and, hence, dismissed. Charles is unable to resist kissing her

but is bewildered. His feelings turn to dismay when they are stumbled on by

Sam and Mary, his valet and Ernestina's aunt's servant, who have come to

the Undercliff for their own privacy. Embarrassed, he swears them to

secrecy.

Now even more of two minds about his marriage, Charles decides to go

to London to discuss his altered financial prospects with Ernestina's

father, a prosperous merchant there. Mr. Freeman is more concerned for the

happiness of his daughter, who evidently loves Charles dearly, so the

engagement stands; but Charles is increasingly uncomfortable with, even

trapped by, his situation. He goes to his club and drinks too much. He

visits a brothel with two of his friends, but finds the entertainment

repellant, and leaves. He picks up a Cockney streetwalker and returns to

her flat with her; when she tells him her name is, coincidentally, Sarah,

Charles becomes ill and, subsequently, returns to his room. The next

morning Charles receives a letter from Grogan, and a note from Sarah with

the name of a hotel in Exeter.

Because the train station nearest to Lyme Regis is in Exeter, Charles

must pass through that town on his way back from London. Having steamed

open the note from Sarah, Sam is confident that they will spend the night

in Exeter, so that Charles can visit Sarah, but they proceed to Lyme, where

Charles and Ernestina are reunited. The narrator recounts that they go on

to marry, have seven children, and live well into the twentieth century. In

the next chapter, the narrator explains that this traditional ending is

just one possibility, a hypothetical future for his characters. Charles

recognized his freedom of choice and "actually" did decide to put up at

Exeter for the night, precisely as Sam had expected.

As the story resumes and continues to unfold, Charles visits Sarah at

her hotel. He must see her in her room because she has supposedly injured

her ankle, though she has purchased the bandage before the "accident"

occurred. Charles is overcome by passion and takes her to bed, only to

discover that she is a virgin, despite what she had told him about the

French lieutenant. She confesses that she has deceived him, says that she

cannot explain why and, furthermore, cannot marry him. Stunned by the whole

experience, Charles visits a nearby church and meditates on the human

condition. He decides that Sarah has been trying to "unblind" him with her

stratagems, so that he would recognize that he is free to choose. He writes

a letter to Sarah, telling her how much she means to him, and then returns

to Lyme to call off his engagement.

Sam does not deliver the letter. Ernestina is distraught when Charles

tells her that he is unworthy to be her husband, more so when she realizes

that the true reason is another woman. Sam correctly surmises that his

master's star will wane as the marriage is called off, so determined to

protect his prospect of marriage to Mary, he leaves his position as

Charles's valet in hope that Ernestina's aunt and her father will help him.

When Charles returns to Exeter, he finds Sarah gone to London, having

left no forwarding address. As he follows her, by train, a bearded figure

sits opposite Charles and watches him as he dozes. The character is the

narrator himself, who professes not to know where Sarah is or what she

wants; indeed, he is wondering what exactly to do with Charles. He compares

writing a novel to fixing a fight in favor of one boxer or another; to seem

less dishonest, he decides to show the "fight" as if "fixed" both ways,

with different "victors," or endings. Because the last ending will seem

privileged by its final position, he flips a coin to determine which ending

to give first.

The narrative resumes the description of Charles's search for Sarah.

He checks agencies for governesses, patrols areas frequented by

prostitutes, and advertises--all without success. He visits the United

States and advertises there. Two years after she disappeared, Charles gets

a cable from his solicitor saying that Sarah has been found. Charles hopes

that Sarah has decided to answer the ad, but the narrator explains that

Mary has seen Sarah enter a house in Chelsea, and that it is Sam who

responded to the ad, now that he is a thriving employee of Mr. Freeman as

well as a happy father and husband, but still slightly guilt-ridden over

his having intercepted the letter at Lyme.

When Charles arrives at Sarah's house, he finds her surprised to see

him and not apologetic about having left him in ignorance of her

whereabouts. She gradually is revealed to be living in the house of Dante

Gabriel Rossetti and several other artists and models of the Pre-Raphaelite

Brotherhood. Charles is shocked, partly by the rather notoriously

unconventional company she is keeping and partly by her lack of repentance

for having deceived him and left him in uncertainty. He accuses her of

implanting a dagger in his breast and then twisting it. She decides not to

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