In his essay "Shooting an Elephant", George Orwell attempts to relay the inhumanity of imperialism. Orwell uses his personal experience with a moral dilemma to convey to the reader the evils which result from colonial politics. An English petty officer in colonial Burma is routinely required to enforce oppressive rules, which he morally opposes. He apparently has even less respect for his Burmese subjects, who routinely ridicule and mock his foreign presence and authority. The story's tension builds when Burmese villagers beckon the officer to quickly kill an elephant who recently trampled a villager. The officer is given conflicting and perhaps unreliable information by the villagers regarding the animals state. Upon finding the elephant, he rightly determines that it poses no present or future safety risk. Nevertheless, the villagers continue their intense pressure upon the English officer to destroy it. Compounding his dilemma, the officer knows the gun provided him is insufficient to complete the distasteful task quickly and mercifully. Logic and compassion for the animal lead him to decide initially against shooting the elephant, but ultimately, he succumbs to the villagers" pressure and kills it.

             What strikes the reader from the very beginning is the author's unrelenting honesty about himself. Instead of describing himself as a hero, he says he was "hated" -- but usually he wasn't even important enough to be hated. He is scared and resentful. He is guilty. He is "ill educated." Because of Orwell's almost painful honesty and willingness to look at his own faults, we know that we'll probably learn some truths in this essay, not just some cliche version of reality.

             The two dominant characters of the essay include the elephant and its executioner, a British officer. The executioner symbolizes the imperial country, and the elephant symbolizes the victim of imperialism.