Animal Farm

There are numerous examples of internal conntradiction in the text of Animal Farm. First and foremost, there are the commandments, which are regularly contradicted and subsequently changed in order to serve the purpose of the pigs.

Another contradiciton can be seen in Squealer's propaganda. He claims that "no one believes more firmly than Comrade Napoleon that all animals are equal", and yet, it is Napoleon who "inhabited separate apartments from the others. He took his meals alone, with two dogs to wait upon him, and always ate from the Crown Derby dinner service which had been in the glass cupboard in the drawing-room."

In terms of the commandments, one contradiction is easily illustrated in Napoleon's declaration that drinking alcohol was punishable by death. Napoleon may have issued the initial decree but contradicts himself when he not only begins drinking alcohol but brewing it as well. As a result, his decree is rewritten to read, "No animal shall drink alcohol TO EXCESS."