Shooting an Elephant
by George Orwell (1936) Advanced
In this simplified extract
from his famous essay Orwell describes his experience as an
imperial policeman in Burma. When an elephant escapes, the
local population expects him to deal with the
situation.
I marched down the hill, looking and feeling a fool. My
rifle was over my shoulder and an ever-growing army of
people followed at my heels.
At the bottom, the elephant was standing eight yards from
the road, his left side towards us. Ignoring the crowd's
approach, he continued tearing up bunches of grass and
stuffing them into his mouth.
I halted on the road. As soon as I saw the elephant I knew
with perfect certainty that I ought not to shoot him. At
that distance, peacefully eating, he looked no more
dangerous than a cow.
I did not want to shoot him
But at that
moment I glanced round at the crowd that now blocked
the road for a long distance on either side. There
were at least two thousand people. More were joining
every minute.
I looked at the sea of faces. All were happy and excited
over this bit of fun. All were certain that the elephant
was going to be shot.
It was like I was a conjurer about to perform a trick. They
did not like me, but with the magical rifle in my hands I
was momentarily worth watching.
A Poor Shot
And suddenly I realized that I had to shoot the elephant
after all.
To come all that
way, rifle in hand, and do nothing – no, that was
impossible. The crowd would laugh at me. And my whole life,
every white man's life in the East, was one long struggle
not to be laughed at.
I
had got to act quickly. I was a poor shot with a rifle and
the ground was soft mud. If the elephant charged and I
missed him...
Even then I was afraid in the ordinary sense, only of the
crowd watching me. If anything went wrong those two
thousand Burmans would see it. . And some of them would
laugh. That would never do.
A Terrible Change
When I pulled
the trigger I did not hear the bang or feel the kick. But I
heard the devilish roar of glee that went up from the
crowd.
In that instant, a mysterious, terrible change had come
over the elephant. He neither stirred nor fell, but every
line of his body altered. He looked suddenly immensely old.
For a simplified version of the
complete text (pdf) here.
You can read the complete unabridged, unsimplified
text here.