Symbolism In Shooting An Elephant By George Orwell

“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.

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.

“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.

In the essay “Shooting an Elephant”, George Orwell recounts his experiences as a British police officer in the British Raj during the 1930s and 40s. During this time period, Great Britain controlled most of South Asia, including the Burman village where Orwell was stationed. He describes the futility of imperialism for both parties involved, directing his experiences to the European audiences of the time. This is meant to provide perspective towards the consequences of European imperialism and internal struggle which Orwell and the British Empire both face. The act of imperialism restricts both the conqueror and the conquered from true freedom and is pointless due to the resistance and morality of human nature.

In the very first paragraph of the story the character tells of his experience on a football field. He stated that “when a nimble Burman tripped me up on the football field and the referee (another Burman) looked the other way, the crowd yelled with hideous laughter” (Orwell 1). The character also recounts of other experiences he has where “insults hooted after me when I was at a safe distance” (Orwell 1). In his own words the character describes how he feels about these situations. He states how the Burman’s actions badly got on his nerves. He explains how overwhelming and upsetting his job makes him, so much so that he wants to quit. It is important to note the characters perception of the Burmese because it shows that his rancor towards them does not affect his longing for respect. This is a basic point that helps set up the story to show what the characters

Elephants have been victims of not just the incessant poaching but also of the civil wars; ultimately making them to fight back. The killing case have gone over the roof, as the “singular perversity” (Siebert 353) of the attacks. In India, “nearly one thousand people have been killed by elephants between 2000 and 2004” (Siebert 353). Several frequent attacks were recorded in Africa and other villages where the denizens were forced to evacuate their houses. ‘nearly one thousand’ which accentuates the gravity of the situation in 4 years had gained a lot of attention from the elephants researchers. Seibert’s prime third perspective, Gay Bradshaw, Oregon State psychologist, claims that that “everybody pretty much agrees that the relationship between elephants and people has dramatically changed” (Siebert 353). The choice of diction ‘dramatically’ indicates that elephants are not being violent towards human beings but they are also doing it intentionally. Dramatic behavior changes over the years are now being explained in the elephants. “Bradshaw and several colleagues argued that today’s elephant populations are suffering from a form of chronic stress, a kind of species-wide trauma” (Siebert 354), due to “decades of poaching and habitat loss” (Siebert 354). Elephants are becoming more destructive and Bradshaw looked into combining “traditional research into elephant behavior with insights about trauma drawn from

The story shows how the identity connects and affects how we see ourselves in the present. The main character has played several identities like a white man, policeman and human. He did not want to kill the elephant as a human, but as a white man, he chose to defend his dignity and shoot the elephant. Under our own cultural, ethnic and racial backgrounds, we have different responsibilities and duties to complete. These factors will determine how you and others see yourself. In the story “Shooting an Elephant”, the main character is a white policeman from the Great British. He needs to kill the elephant and protect the villagers’ safety which was threatened by the elephant. But if he changes his identity, he will have a different perspective. From the conversation with the local people, he knew that the elephant would not be aggressive unless someone got close to it. Therefore, if someone wants to take the elephant, they may underestimate it and be killed. The main character might feel guilty because he knows the elephant is ignorant afterwards.

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

It cannot fairly be said that in Aravind Adiga’s novel, The White Tiger, the only way to escape the Darkness and advance in society is through violence, as an alternative route to the Light is presented in the story arc of Vijay, the pig herder’s son turned politician. Balram asserts that the murder of Ashok is not only the direct cause of his new wealth and status, but also the only possible trigger for his newfound social mobility. Yet, this is contradicted earlier in the story when he presents Vijay, the bus driver, as his role model for a successful person. Vijay, in order to achieve his elevated position, resorted to prostitution; despite not being a desirable alternative to violence, it is an alternative all the same and therefore violence is not the only way to escape the Darkness. Following this logic, it is Balram’s story and the immediate increase in wealth that results from the murder of Ashok that best supports violence as the only means of moving into the Light, and Vijay’s story is the best evidence against that point of view.

In Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger, Balram Halwai, a witty and complex teen, discusses through a collection of letters the disturbing yet captivating exploit of how he evolved from a village peasant to a successful entrepreneur. Balram, born as a low caste Indian, feels compressed and subdued by working as a servant. He makes a series of choices that ultimately lead him to his escape of the rooster coop, a theme in the novel representing the corruption of society and the "greatest thing to come to this country in the ten thousand years of its history" (147). Included in those choices is his decision to murder his employer, Mr. Ashok.

The story of “Rikki-tikki-tavi” directly describes the English present in India and also the idea of domestication. The story “The White Seal,” exemplifies how India’s resources were taken and the brutality of the natives being forced from their homes by the British. Imperialistic ideas are visible throughout the novel as

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

Elephant is a short story written by Polly Clark in 2006. My focus point is William and his life, which I will analyze and interpret. I will also discuss the

In the novel, The White Tiger, by Aravind Adiga the main character, is Balram, one of the children in the “darkness” of India. Adiga sheds a new light on the poor of India, by writing from the point of view of a man who was at one time in the “darkness” or the slums of India and came into the “light” or rich point of view in India. Balram’s job as a driver allows him to see both sides of the poverty line in India. He sees that the poor are used and thrown away, while the rich are well off and have no understanding of the problems the poor people must face. The servants are kept in a mental “Rooster Coop” by their masters. The government in India supposedly tries to help the poor, but if there is one thing Adiga proves in The White Tiger,

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