Blog Post #2

In both story Shooting an Elephant and A Rose for Emily, we see how the Southern whites and Englishmen influence the protagonist in different ways. In the story of Emily, Falkner shows how the southern white of the town hold Emily as the symbol of tradition but subtly pushed Emily to become the devil in the end. As Emily growing up, everyone in the town expected her to be the symbol of their old tradition and will bear that tradition with her forever. However, Emily failed them. She rode out with Homer Barron, and people started to discuss about “noblesse oblige”. Then after people heard she bought arsenic, they consider “it would be the best thing”. They thought dating and marrying a northern man was a “disgrace to the town and a bad example to the young people”. As we read these quote from the story, we can clearly see that the southern whites want her to be an angel symbolize the tradition but as she failing to do so, they consider her the devil and show no compassion for her. As the daughter of the “hero” of the town, her every move was under the watch. She had no secret and every move of her was being discussed by the southern whites.  Her privacy was violated when the people violently open the room above the stairs that everyone knew for forty years, even after she died. No wonder why she becomes the murderer instead of the symbol of the town.

In another story, Orwell depicted the narrator as someone who always found himself in the conflict. As an Englishman, who colonize Burman, he always found himself disgusted with the system. However, he still had the power as a colonizer. When he had a gun in his hand and to shoot an elephant, he found himself in conflict again. He was conflicted again, because of his identity---an Englishman. He can not let the Burmese laugh at him and be a joke everyone discuss about because he is the conqueror, ruler of the Burmese. He knew he had to take that shot. On the other hand, he didn’t want to shoot and the elephant worth a lot. In the end, he took the shot and killed the elephant and all Burmese was cheering, and he was not embarrassed. In the end he submitted, lost his freedom of choice and became a real Englishman.

In both story, the protagonist both became the person that they never predicted. No one can see a noble lady became a murderer and hide the corpse inside the room to be with him forever. Or the narrator of Shooting the Elephant become someone who trying to suppress the local Burmese and turn into a real colonizer. They were both the victim of the class conflict.