Shooting an Elephant Literary Analysis

As a European white man in the British colony of India, George Orwell, in his narrative essay Shooting an Elephant, describes one of his most memorable events while living in the Southeast Asian nation of Burma. Orwell’s purpose is to share the absolute horror of living in imperialism. He adopts a tense tone throughout his essay by using vivid description and gruesome imagery in order to relate the incident with the elephant to what it is like to live in imperialism.

George Orwell’s ‘Shooting an Elephant’ (Orwel, 1936) represents a number of strangers being involved in a combined encounter. The situation throughout the essay represents the unjust British occupation of Burma, the hatred towards him as a British officer and the elephant symbolising the British. The part of the text chosen clearly exemplifies how a forced duty can lead to hatred. The text chosen displays that he is forced to encounter the Burmese people yet they despise him. Although the encounter with the Burmese improves with the arrival of the elephant, Orwell still has a sense of isolation. Throughout the text Orwell questions the presence of the British in the East exploring that the encounter with the Burmese should not have took place.

George Orwell describes to us in “Shooting an elephant” the struggle that his character faces when to win the mobs approval and respect when he shoots down an innocent animal and sacrifices what he believes to be right. Orwell is a police officer in Moulmein, during the period of the British occupation of Burma. An escaped elephant gives him the opportunity to prove himself in front of his people and to be able to become a “somebody” on the social

Orwell does this to help give another example of how he is trying to inform his readers about imperialism. In James A. Tyner’s journal, “Landscape and the mask of self in George Orwell’s ‘Shooting an elephant”, Tyner agrees that, “for the moment, that the elephant does symbolize the British Empire” (265). Orwell gets a call that an elephant has attacked and killed a Burmese man for no reason. This allows the reader to make the connection the elephant’s attack on the Burmese was exactly what the British were doing to the Burmese. The British was trying to establish dominance over the Burmese people and would do whatever it took to gain control. The same thing applies for the elephant. The elephant establishes his dominance by “destroying somebody’s bamboo hut, killing a cow and raiding some fruit-stalls and devouring the stock; it also had met the municipal rubbish van, and, when the driver jumped out and took to his heels, had turned the van over and inflicted violence upon it” (Orwell, 44). This shows the reader that just like the British, the elephant would do what it took to establish its dominance. Orwell explains that the death of the elephant was a long and drawn out process. This is exactly what happened to the British Empire. The Elephants death shows the fall of the British Empire by its own members. Orwell mentions numerous times “I did not

“Shooting an Elephant” is an essay written by George Orwell, first published in the journal New Writing in 1936. In this essay, the author tells his own story about when he was working as a police officer for the Indian Imperial Police in Burma.

“Shooting an Elephant” is an essay written by George Orwell, who was an Assistant Superintendent in the British Indian Imperial Police in Burma from 1922 to 1927. The essay was published in 1936. Burma was occupied by the British over a period of 62 years (1823-1886) and it was directed as a province of India until it became a separate colony in 1937. In the essay, Orwell narrates the scene of the killing of an elephant in Burma and expresses the feelings that he goes through during the event. The writer’s theme is that imperialism is not an effective way of governing. It can be decoded through his

“Shooting an Elephant” is a short anecdote written by George Orwell. The story depicts a young man, Orwell, who has to decide whether to bend the rules for his superiors or to follow his own path. George Orwell works as the sub-divisional police officer of Moulmein, a town in the British colony of Burma. He, along with the rest of the English military are disrespected by the Burmese due to the English invading their territory and taking over. Over time, Orwell, the narrator, has already begun to question the presence of the British in the Far East. He states, theoretically and secretly, he was “all for the Burmese and all against their oppressors, the British.” Orwell describes himself as “young and ill-educated,” bitterly hating his job. Orwell uses powerful imagery and diction to convey a depressing and sadistic tone to the story. At the end of the story, he faces a dilemma: to kill the elephant or not.

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

George Orwell, author of, "Shooting an Elephant" reveals his inner conflicts to the audience by offering in depth description, using intensity, and symbolism through the act of shooting the elephant. His narration helps him do so by giving descriptive scenarios in the story. Orwell's narration can also be used to examine the role of India and Great Britain at the story's time in history. The narration then allows Orwell to use symbolism in place of description. Orwell uses narration to help explain his inner conflicts and to what is happening in each setting of the story.

In “Shooting an Elephant,” George Orwell achieves two achievements : he shows us his personal experience and his expression while he was in Burma; he use the metaphor of the elephant to explain to describe what Burma looked like when it was under the British Imperialism. The special about this essay is that Orwell tells us a story not only to see the experience that he had in Burma; he also perfectly uses the metaphor of the elephant to give us deep information about the Imperialism. By going through this essay, we can deeply understand what he thinks in his head. He successfully uses the word choices and the sentences to express his feeling. By reading this essay, Orwell succeeds us with his mesmerizing sentences and shows us the

In George Orwell’s essay, “Shooting an Elephant”,George explores the complexities of imperialism–and how they are mutually pernicious to both people involved. He wrote, “A story always sounds clear enough at a distance, but the nearer you get to the scene of events the vaguer it becomes.” The idea is demonstrated when he hunts down the elephant. Though the Burmese people warn him of the elephant’s rampage and tell him he’s in danger, he finally finds the elephant peacefully grazing–and it is an entirely different creature than what the people described to him.The idea is noteworthy to the essay because, on a prodigious scale, it uncovers the complex characters of imperialism.

In conclusion George Orwell essay “ Shooting An Elephant” expresses through his language that pride was something that pushed him to pull the trigger even though if it had been him alone he would have never pulled it.  He also showed  through his use of colour language and imagery the regret he feels for shooting the

Have you ever been pressured into doing something you didn’t want to, but felt like you had no other option? The narrator in Orwell's, “Shooting an Elephant” had a very similar experience. He was pressed by the Burmese into committing a senseless killing that he did not deem necessary. This transformation of the main characters mentality and morals gives the audience a terrific example of characterization, which would not be possible without the effective use of point of view in Orwell's story.

In George Orwell’s “To Shoot an Elephant” the reader is teleported to Southeast Asia; Orwell writes from the perspective of an English police officer for a British colony in Burma. It is quickly made known to the reader that with the Imperialistic nature of the British Empire, the people of Burma give the English colonist a stigma. This stigma causes our narrator to be jeered and laughed upon by the native people, which causes him to in turn have a hatred towards the Burmese. So instead of properly doing his job as an officer, he would rather avoid contact with the indigenous people. Until, one fateful day; a captivated elephant gets loose during mating season. Since the elephant is in heat it indirectly begins to wreak havoc, now with all eyes on the narrator, he now must do something. He is sent out to defuse the situation without killing the animal, but the situation ends with a bullet riddled elephant from our narrator’s rifle. Flash-forward some years and now the narrator, during a midlife crisis, is looking back on the events of the incident in Burma. So, was our narrator the victim? Was he justified in shooting the elephant? Does our narrator resolve his midlife crisis after looking back on his actions as a youth?

In George Orwell’s “To Shoot an Elephant” the reader is teleported to Southeast Asia; Orwell writes from the perspective of an English police officer for a British colony in Burma. It is quickly made known to the reader that with the Imperialistic nature of the British Empire, the people of Burma give the English colonist a stigma. This stigma causes our narrator to be jeered and laughed upon by the native people, which causes him to in turn have a hatred towards the Burmese. So instead of properly doing his job as an officer, he would rather avoid contact with the indigenous people. Until, one fateful day; a captivated elephant gets loose during mating season. Since the elephant is in heat it indirectly begins to wreak havoc, now with all eyes on the narrator, he now must do something. He is sent out to defuse the situation without killing the animal, but the situation ends with a bullet riddled elephant from our narrator’s rifle. Flash-forward some years and now the narrator, during a midlife crisis, is looking back on the events of the incident in Burma. So, was our narrator the victim? Was he justified in shooting the elephant? Does our narrator resolve his midlife crisis after looking back on his actions as a youth?