“He wears a mask and his face grows to fit it”

What I find most interesting in Orwell’s work is this whole idea of theory and convention being in opposition to a reality- a reality that ultimately mends itself and shapes itself to fit into theory, but that which in itself is highly individualised and moral. Hence, the mask is really the convention; the mainstream colonial discourse of how the colonizer ought to be, how he is percieved and how he ought to relate to the ‘native’ other. In Shooting the Elephant, of course this is questioned, for we have a narrator who struggles to fit into the mask granted to him, and who on the contrary feels pressure in needing to act out his role, and in trying not to appear inadequate as a person in power. Like Chatterjee implies, it is a performance that needs constant revision and monitoring because unlike theory or convention which is performing to given rules and codes, this is a performance that is not shielded by or elevated by a “stage”, a platform, or divider. Instead, we see the narrator with the masses, the ‘native’ community, and somehow the lines and binaries are less clear and helpful.

However, this mask is not merely one that the colonizer wears. The “yellow faces”, “happy and excited over this bit of fun” wear masks too- the ‘natives’ though conventionally subalterns, seem almost amused in watching the officer trying to fulfill his role and shoot the elephant. Like the narrator tells himself, he is the puppet, the ‘native’ the puppeteers, controlling his every move merely by expecting him to act like the colonizer, the all powerful one. Yet if this truly gives them power and authority is still questionable, for Orwell still presents them as the voiceless/faceless community