Comparison and Contrast JB - Essay Example

Download file to see previous pages... I was sub-divisional police officer of the town, and in an aimless, petty kind of way anti-European feeling was very bitter” (Orwell).
Once locals came to him and reported that one of the elephants in the market brawls: he had the pairing period when these usually peaceful animals become aggressive. One of the workers was killed, thus the elephant must have been also killed. The police officer Blair took the gun and ran to the market. Having seen an elephant, which, seemingly, already calmed down and was peacefully eating the bush, he aimed, but something stopped him. At last Eric Blair killed the elephant, but felt neither pleasure, nor pride. The mask of "white mister", fortunately, never suited him. He accuses the imperialism and the relations set by it of the death of the elephant: “All this was perplexing and upsetting. For at that time I had already made up my mind that imperialism was an evil thing and the sooner I chucked up my job and got out of it the better. Theoretically – and secretly, of course – I was all for the Burmese and all against their oppressors, the British. As for the job I was doing, I hated it more bitterly than I can perhaps make clear” (Orwell). But the quoted fragment concerns not only the relationship of colonialists and colonized. Orwell was able to feel and understand the mood of the masses, described the important psychological connection between the crowd and the leader. Between those who are given the power like the British police officer in a Burmese solitude, and the masses, which observe with interest how this person will dispose of what he was given. Not only observes, but also expects and demands. Eric Blair didnt want to kill the elephant, but couldnt prevent this and had to do that. Another person in his place, on the contrary, would make it with pleasure, to confirm the status.
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