He was taunted, baited, and treated so terrible by the people it was hard to keep his cool. The shooting of the elephant in Orwell's story is the central focus from which Orwell builds his argument through the two dominant characters, the elephant and the British officer. The British officer, acts as a symbol of the imperial country and the elephant is the victim of imperialism.
Together, the solider and the elephant turns this into an attack on the evils of imperialism. The shooting of the elephant shows the different aspects of imperialism. The elephant and the British officer help to show the real nature of imperialism. The shooting of the elephant is the incident that reveals that imperialism inflicts damage on both parties in a …show more content… As stated before the Burmese people hated the British officer, but now they go to him to get rid of the elephant.
They even help him to find the elephant. Imperialism also creates reliance on foreign country. The killing of Dravidian coolie and the reaction of the public is also a side effect of Imperialism. They did not care about the elephant, but with the officer's help they will get the meat. Imperialism hurts both the parent country and the country that is being controlled.
The dying of the elephant shows, even if a foreign country tries to do whatever it can to change a country, the country will do whatever to resist the change. However, when he looked around and saw all of the natives watching and waiting in anticipation for him to kill the elephant, he realized that he ultimately had no way out other than to kill the elephant.
This story deals with the internal conflict between his personal morals and his duty to his country but more importantly, his duty to uphold the reputation of the white man in a foreign land. Orwell's decision to kill the elephant is a direct result of imperialism. Imperialism goes way farther than the average person could ever imagine, because it can overtake a persons life and no matter how much they want to do something on their own imperialism is always there in the back of their mind.
This could give reason for the Burmese people hating the British Empire if some of the people see them less than an animal then how could they stay in good faith with. He knows that it would be wrong to kill the elephant. The owner of the elephant would lose his most valuable possession. Elephants were used for all kinds of labor, especially agriculture. In lower Burma, during a time when the British Empire had colonised a large sum of the world. Yet, they would degrade a European walking the streets, he was subjected to slander and assault just because he was British.
Orwell felt anger towards the natives, thinking their sole purpose was to upset him. Open Document. Essay Sample Check Writing Quality. With his final decision, the elephant finally lay dying in front of thousands of people. He said that he was forced to shoot it because the Burmese people were expecting him to do that. Orwell was ambivalent about imperialism.
At the beginning of his essay, he recalls how Burmese people treated him when he was still working in Burma as a police officer. Not only he was hated by Burmese, but all Europeans who were living in Burma went through the same experience. One day, Orwell was ordered by the sub-inspector to do something about the elephant that was rampaging around the bazaar.
He did not want to kill it; he just want to frighten it with a loud noise from the gun. The elephant had destroyed the whole town, from killing animals to damaging houses and stores.
Many believe he has caused problems that affect the American people here at home and around the world. Essays Essays FlashCards. Browse Essays. Sign in. Essay Sample Check Writing Quality. Show More. Read More. Words: - Pages: 6. Shooting An Elephant Symbolism It shows how powerful the Burmese were before they started the war and how weak they were after.
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