Shooting An Elephant

In the story, Shooting an Elephant, written by George Orwell, he tells his story about what happened to him on that particular day. Orwell was a European living in a native village with his other European companions. He was also a police officer for the little town. But Orwell hated his job and was very unhappy. Because, all the natives hated him because he was a European so every day they would call him names and yell and pick on him, no one respected him. Then, one day an elephant got loose in the town and everyone was looking at what Orwell was going to do about it. When Orwell went to inspect what was happening he saw that a man had been killed by the elephant, asked for a rifle and went to find it. While doing this all the natives were following him, seeing what he was going to do. He felt a bit shy in a way but also happy that they were following him, not hating him. When he found the elephant he wasn't going to kill it. He says in his story “but I did not want to shoot the elephant”(George Orwell), it was doing its own thing and its rage had seemed to die down. But, with everyone looking at him, Orwell was that he was going to have to kill the giant animal or people would look down upon him. So he did, and people cheered and then the crowd died down and everything was over. Orwell felt good with himself hoping now people would like him more.

Work Cited

Orwell, George. "Shooting an Eephant." George Orwell 1903-1950. Web. 21 Apr. 2015. <http://www.k-1.com/Orwell/site/work/essays/elephant.html>.