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Shooting an Elephant George Orwell is just a pen name for Eric Arthur Blair. He wrote many novels from inspirations around the world. He was born in India but was a British author. A good amount of that inspiration came from being an India Imperial policeman. Shooting an Elephant contains a variety of symbols like the rifle, the elephant, and the imperialism which gives the reader an insight into his essay. The first symbol is the rifle. It represents different meanings that portray Orwell and the police. As far back as anyone can remember the police has had guns or some type of weapon for their job of peace keeping. The gun represents authority. It represents who is in charge, so wouldn’t it be right for the police to have one? The rifle inflicts fear into people willing to cross the line of authority. As Orwell said, “Here was I, the white man with his gun, standing in front of the unarmed native crowd…” (Orwell 327). It always has, and always will be the symbol of authority. The rifle also symbolizes Orwell’s power. Alone his power is that of his .44 Winchester. Not powerful …show more content…
Many would just think it to be an animal that went on a rampage but there is a meaning behind it. It’s death by Orwell shows the British Empire’s fall by its own officials. When Orwell talked about the “must” he was referring to the British Empire enforcing their dominance over the Burmese. Shooting the elephant was a difficult choice on Orwell’s part. He did not want to shoot it for he saw no threat once the must went away. The ones that wanted him to shoot it was the thousands of people behind him all excited to see him fire the rifle. “I could feel their two thousand wills pressing me forward, irresistibly” (Orwell 327). What that decision really represented was the British official working in the British colony. Orwell was the state, and the people were the people they serve. He either had to make the state happy, or the people he served
He is not well liked by the local people and states secretly that he is all for the Burman people, and that he opposes the British’s implications. During his time there, an elephant in ‘must’ starts rampaging through the colonization. There is not much responsibility Orwell undertakes until the elephant kills a man. At that point, he decides to pursue the elephant. After his tracking, he finds the elephant and notes that it was peacefully eating and had a sort of “grandmotherly air” with it. He does not feel the need to confront the elephant anymore, until he sees the locals waiting for him to take action. He reluctantly calls for a large rifle and shoots the now peaceful beast. The elephant does not die right away, and even after Orwell has fired multiple rounds into it, the animal continues to suffer in pain. Orwell cannot bare the sight of it, and walks away feeling as though he has just murdered such a gentle creature. At the end of the story, it is revealed that Orwell acted the way he did because he wanted to save face with the Burman people and with the Imperialists. He was acting in accordance to what he believed others would want him to do, and not thinking with his own conscious. He was carelessly and blindly following the chain of command, without a second
At this point the only way one would know about the elephant, is through the destruction left in its wake such as how the elephant “destroyed someone’s bamboo hut,” how it overturned a “municipal rubbish van,” and a “Dravidian coolie” that could “not have been dead many minutes.”(Orwell). Henceforth the ambiguity grants the readers to paint a picture of the elephant until its unveiling. From Orwell’s description of elephant, the reader can only surmise that the elephant is terrifying rampaging beast that needs to be put down coinciding with the “two thousand wills”(Orwell) forcing Orwell forward to kill the elephant. Unbeknownst to the reader and younger Orwell at the time, the elephant was merely going through must, a seasonal frenzied state of mind of male elephants, and typically is far calmer. However, without knowing this information just like Orwell, one would be taken aback by Orwell’s description of the elephant. Although Orwell insinuates that the Orwell is a ghastly beast by describing the carcass of one of the elephant’s victims mangled bodies lying with its “arms crucified” with an “expression of unendurable agony;”(Orwell) nevertheless he is quick to juxtapose the elephant's rampage to how the elephant really is by describing the serenity as it was “peacefully eating” with a “grandmotherly air.” In contrast with the elephant’s aforementioned bloodlust, the elephant was also depicted as taking not the “slightest notice” of Orwell and “the crowd’s
George Orwell dramatically writes about his time in Burma as an Imperial Officer in his essay “Shooting an Elephant”. He communicates in detail how he disagrees with the concept of imperialism but likewise dislikes the taunting Burmese community. Orwell goes on to recount the time an elephant rampages the village and how enlightening of an experience it was. Symbolism is a heavy orchestrator in this essay, with Orwell relating the concept of imperialism to several events such as the elephant’s rampage, the dead coolie, and the actual shooting of the elephant.
Orwell is a very complex man, he begins to contradict himself by saying he hates what imperialism does but chooses to work for that government. Even though he states that he hated his job, his actions show imperialism. When having the choice to kill or not to kill the elephant, he chose death. This here specifies how imperialism took over; oddly enough not by the government but by the people. The people staring and waiting for him to ki...
When he finial find the elephant Orwell say “I knew with perfect certainty that I ought not to shoot him.” But when he lays his eyes on the crowd he changes his stance to “but I did not want to shoot the elephant.”(Orwell 199). He felt guilty for shooting the elephant when he describe that the elephant worth more alive than dead, but despite the many reason not to shoot the elephant, he took a shot. Orwell describes “when I pulled the trigger I did not hear the bang or feel the kick …I fired again into the same spot…I fired a third time. That was the shot that did it for him.”(199) the shooting of the elephant represent the Burma people trying to stay alive and over powering by the
It shows how desirous the nation and acts that they like to not enforce tyranny on the imperialized society. The comparison to the sahib, it is a terms that were used to name aristocratic rulers. It is a symbol of some kind of image. British imperialism is hostile environment and is justified of exploitation by controlling Burma. The story sets the tone of the author’s speech to be un-comforting. This story shows his flaws and how he taunts others, even his own people of Burma. The elephant is a symbol viewing the vast supremacy of the imperialism. They destroyed everything on the islands. The author’s boldness expresses agony which is a bad thing. He indicated that there were more than a few reasons not to kill the elephant, “power shot”. He lacks opportunities for his own people in contradiction of his moral beliefs and chooses to pulverize this elephant. The elephant was considered a good luck symbol for Burma
George Orwell was a British author that served for five years as an India Imperial Police officer. Orwell died at the early age of 46 years old from tuberculosis. In Orwell’s “Shooting and Elephant” he displays many different feelings such as guilt, hatred, and oppression.
The Burmese people cannot rely on the British law to keep order; the British Empire enforces the function of their village by brutal force. These people are defenseless. The elephant in the story is a very important figure that symbolizes many concepts. The animal gave the narrator a better glimpse of the real nature of imperialism as he stated in the opening sentence of the second paragraph: “It was a tiny incident in itself, but gave me a better glimpse than I had before of the real nature of imperialism- the real motives for which the despotic government act” (149). The narrator uses the term despotic government that means tyrannical ruler, having a few rights and living under fear of the government. The elephant symbolizes hatred of his job. The officer hated the empire abuse of power and the role he has in it. He also hates the Burmese people make his life harder by humiliating him “All I knew was the hatred of the empire I served and my rage against the evil-spirted little beast who tried to make
The quest for power is one which has been etched into the minds of men throughout history. However, it can be said that true power is not a result of one’s actions but comes from the following one’s own beliefs without being influenced by others. This principle sets up the story for Shooting an Elephant by George Orwell. The protagonist, Orwell himself, is a sub divisional police officer in Burma, a British colony. Orwell must try to find and use his inner power when he is faced with the decision of whether or not to kill an elephant which has ravaged the Burman’s homes. The state of power established through the imperialistic backdrop show that Orwell, as a colonist, should be in control. As well, the perspective and ideas given by Orwell show his true character and lessen the overall power set up for him. Lastly, the symbols shown are representations of traditional forms of power, but take on different implications in the story. In Shooting an Elephant, George Orwell uses setting, characterization and symbols to show that true power comes from following the dictates of one’s conscience.
The character, himself, is part of the British rule and is supposed to have all of the power. The Burmese, though, dangle the power in front of him. He is weak and unsure of himself, stating that he “wears a mask, and his face grows to fit it” (60). The character is not able to stand up for what he believes in -- that is, not shooting the elephant. There is a back and forth struggle in his mind about whether or not the elephant needs to be killed. Orwell’s character is fully aware that it is wrong and immoral to shoot an innocent creature, but eventually secedes to the demands of the Burmese, attempting to prove his cooperation and loyalty to those watching. In a way, the Burmese represent the pressures of society. Because of this, the audience can sympathize with the main character. There are always times when we, the readers, are unsure of ourselves, but we eventually make a decision. Whether we make the decision for ourselves or are assisted by others, in the end, we must take responsibility for our own actions. In a broader sense, Orwell’s character represents the internal conflict that everyone faces: should we conform to society or should we be our own
Orwell speaks of how he is so against imperialism, but gives in to the natives by shooting the elephant to prove he is strong and to avoid humiliation. He implies that he does not want to be thought of as British, but he does not want to be thought the fool either. Orwell makes his decision to shoot the elephant appear to be reasonable but underneath it all he questions his actions just as he questions those of the British. He despised both the British Empire as well as the Burmese natives, making everything more complicated and complex. In his essy he shows us that the elephant represents imperialism; therefore, the slow destruction of the elephant must represent the slow demise of British Imperialism.
The British officer, who did not want to shoot the elephant, ultimately killed it with a reluctant intention. It depicts that a British white man killed the elephant meaning the British themselves will bring their end. The real motive of his action was his fear of being jeered by the Burmese people, which reveals that British Empire had a fear of being declined by its colonized people. While British Empire ruled the Burma’s economy and internal and external policy, they missed to take a control over the Burmese people’s wicked behavior toward Europeans. Indeed, British Empire applied on Burma a socio-cultural type of imperialism in which they tried to transform the Burmese’s language, religion and customs into their own. The aligning point is that British imperialists tried to do it by using force and violence which doubles the effect of such policy. Ultimately, it increases the rate of uprising and hatred of the natives and insidiously fastens the process of its
In 1936 George Orwell wrote a short story titled "Shooting an Elephant.” In it he discusses a fictional story of a man who kills an elephant and the implications that arise afterward. He relates it to British Imperialism and uses the individual's experiences as a reference to larger experiences that we all face. Many issues of the societal pressures and morality of killing arise over the death of the elephant as well as how the narrator’s identity was altered by his environment. While it appears to be a story of a rampant elephant being euthanized, George Orwell uses the story as an analogy to describe man's inner struggle between acceptance, morality, and the pursuit of power.
...o the wrong spot cause the poor animal to die "very slowly and in great agony." In spite of Orwell putting "shot after shot into his heart and down his throat," the elephant lives thirty minutes after its "tortured gasps" force Orwell to leave. Many years later, Orwell still seems bothered by the fact that pride, not necessity, caused him to destroy the animal.
"Shooting an Elephant" is perhaps one of the most anthologized essays in the English language. It is a splendid essay and a terrific model for a theme of narration. The point of the story happens very much in our normal life, in fact everyday. People do crazy and sometimes illegal moves to get a certain group or person to finally give them respect. George Orwell describes an internal conflict between his personal morals and his duty to his country to the white man's reputation. The author's purpose is to explain the audience (who is both English and Burmese) about the kind of life he is living in Burma, about the conditions, circumstances he is facing and to tell the British Empire what he think about their imperialism and his growing displeasure for the imperial domination of British Empire.