It is clear that Orwell uses the images of Shooting an Elephant to portray himself as an innocent victim of politics, but he reveals himself to be a burned-out and bigoted young man. As to his job as a sub-divisional police officer, he states, "I hated it more bitterly than I perhaps make clear" (Orwell 570). He is disgusted with the "stinking cages" of the jails, the "gray and cowed" prisoners and the "scarred buttocks" of those who had been flogged (Orwell 570). However, as a policeman he would have had to be responsible for these tortures - tortures that were meant to oppress the Burmese people.
He realizes that the British Raj is "an unbreakable tyranny" and states that he "was all for the Burmese and against their oppressors, the British" (Orwell 570). In spite of this expression of support for the Burmese, Orwell has no love or respect for these people. He regards them as "evil-spirited little beasts" and states that his "greatest joy would be to drive a bayonet into a Buddhist priest's guts" (Orwell 570). Orwell makes it plain that he hates his job, the Raj, and the people of Burma, and has concluded, "the sooner I chucked up my job and got out of it the better" (Orwell 570).
One morning, Orwell receives a phone call informing him that an elephant was ravaging the marketplace on the other side of town. The elephant was a working animal and had gone "must", but the owner - the only person who could control the beast - was gone. The elephant appeared in the poorest part of town and destroyed a hut, killed a cow, smashed some market stalls, and ate fruit, overturned a municipal trash wagon, and stomped a man to death. Orwell sends for an elephant rifle, and the villagers follow him to see the shooting of the elephant. He is hesitant about shooting the elephant, but one wonders if he would have been so hesitant if the elephant had gone wild in the British neighborhood, destroying English property and stomping on of the his English friends to death in the mud.
Orwell describes how the man lives in the same world as he, and when the man died part of Orwell's mind died with him. ... Capital punishment diminishes our innocence. Does our loss of innocence leave us in despair? ... The loss of our innocence is changing us into a violent and brutal race. ... George Orwell shows how the death penalty weakens society's moral basis. ...
Orwell paints a hue of irony cast upon the dominating tone of agitation. ... (Orwell 90) When one fails against himself, anxiety entails. ... Orwell presents the orator with the mien of an idealistic villain. ... - (161) The party's anxiety is mocked in the embellished attempt to convey their innocence. ... The details presented by Orwell depict a fallen hero. ...
I will be referring to other social commentary novels such as Hard Times by Charles Dickens, and The Road to Wigan Pier by George Orwell. ... Although written nearly a hundred years later, George Orwell's Road to Wigan Pier is a great example of social commentary. ... Like Gaskell, Orwell came from a lower-upper middle class background. ... One could say that Orwell's novel is non-fiction, and therefore bound to be a more effective tool to highlight social problems. ... Because of their respective social class, and despite Jem Wilson's innocence, the police officer automati...
In the novella Animal Farm by George Orwell, Old Major's dream of a socialist utopia causes the animals to turn against one another and Napoleon and Snowball compete for power and cause the division of the farm; in the novel Lord of the Flies by William Golding, Jack's need for power leads to the destruction of the island and the death of Piggy and Simon. ... It was a dream of the Earth as it will be when man has vanished" (Orwell 11). ... " (Orwell 34). ... The boys have no morality or innocence because of the situations arising around them. ... Jack has lost his innoc...
It could almost be considered a younger minded version of the classic novel, "1984- by George Orwell, where an other-worldly attempt of societal control leads one individual to question and fight the totalitarian system. ... They would rather believe that their young ones have only wholesome thoughts and feelings, and try to shield them from all sexual content in order to "protect their innocence."" ...
"Save England before it blows up, like the springing of a mine" (Hillis-Miller 1998, 31) is the warning embedded in Charles Dickens's Bleak House, though it seems far from the time in which the novel was born. The 1850's saw the staging of the Great Exhibition, an event through which England could boast, according to the Times, "of that day when all ages and climes shall be gathered round the throne of the maker" (Schlicke, p48). Dickens was most certainly not to be found amongst this inertia of idol worship. For the novelist, the year was not one that should inspire celebration or s...
