to put the elephant out of its misery and end the uncomfortable situation. The three shots are symbolically significant, as they can be seen as representing the three Anglo-Burmese Wars. The elephant's resilience, then, represents the Burmese citizens and culture under the oppressive rule of the British. Despite the three shots, the police officer continues to shoot the dying elephant without ending its life. Later on, the officer receives word that it took the elephant half an hour to die.

In "Shooting an Elephant," Orwell shoots the elephant not because he wants to but because imperialism dictates that he must act in a certain way. As an imperial policeman, Orwell must maintain authority at all times. As he says in the text:

A sahib has got to act like a sahib.

In this case, the crowd demands that he shoot the elephant. After all, it is causing chaos in the village, and they want to share in its meat. Because of the nature of imperialism, Orwell must oblige them. If he does not, he will lose face and be humiliated. This idea is shown clearly through the following line:

The sole thought in my mind was that if anything went wrong those two thousand Burmans would see me pursued, caught, trampled on and reduced to a grinning corpse like that Indian up the hill . . . That would never do.

He shoots the elephant three times because he wants to ensure a quick death. Neither the first nor the second shot kills the elephant, and Orwell observes how much the animal suffers. To put it out of its misery, therefore, he fires for a third and final time. 

Orwell derives no pleasure from this act, but it teaches him an important lesson about imperialism: that it forces people to do things that they do not always want to do. 

Orwell was a sub-divisional police officer of the British Empire in Burma when it was a colony under British rule. He was hated by the Burmese, who understandably resented his imperial presence. One day, he received a call about an escaped tame elephant ravaging a local bazaar; it had already destroyed stalls, a home, livestock, and a van. Even worse, the elephant had killed a man. Orwell notes, “As soon as I saw the dead man, I sent an orderly to a friend’s house nearby to borrow an elephant rifle.” This request grabbed the Burmese people’s rapt attention. When Orwell saw elephant peacefully eating in a paddy field, he approached it, and it seemed like “the whole population of the quarter” followed him as eager spectators to watch the shooting. He commented, “It was a bit of fun to them, as it would be to an English crowd; besides, they wanted the meat.”

Orwell actually had not intended to shoot the animal, but carried the rifle in case he needed it for self-defense. He did not even want to execute it, but ultimately chose to for a few reasons. First, he felt pressure by the crowd (a “sea of yellow faces above the garish clothes”) that expected him to do so. Second, he realized that he was temporarily relieved of the Burmese people’s hatred: “They did not like me, but with the magical rifle in my hands I was momentarily worth watching.” Third, he realized that out of pride and in order to uphold his status as a British officer in front of the Burmese, he felt compelled to carry out the shooting: “Here was I, the white man with his gun, standing in front of the unarmed native crowd – seemingly the leading actor of the piece; but in reality I was only an absurd puppet pushed to and fro by the will of those yellow faces behind.”

In other words, if Orwell capitulated and did not execute the elephant, he would humiliate himself as well as the British Empire. He realized that

To come all that way, rifle in hand, with two thousand people marching at my heels, and then to trail feebly away, having done 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.

He felt he had no choice but to appear strong and courageous in front of the Burmese people. So after the first shot, Orwell shot the elephant two more times in order to take it down. After seeing that the animal was still breathing, he shot it two more times. When those shots did not finish off the suffering animal, Orwell shot it repeatedly with his small rifle. He justified these shots by reasoning that he needed to put the elephant out of pain: “the tortured breathing continued without a pause. He was dying, very slowly and in great agony … I felt that I had got to put an end to that dreadful noise.”

In the end, Orwell knew that the elephant’s killing of a man provided sufficient legal pretext for executing it. Nonetheless, he admitted that he had shot the elephant “solely to avoid looking a fool.”

The author shoots the elephant because he feels he must maintain his authority position, but he also does it from a very human position of peer pressure.  He feels the two thousand wills pressing against him, and he just cannot go against them.  The story presents a struggle that most people deal with at one time or another in their lives.

In the last paragraph of the essay, the narrator states very clearly why he felt compelled to kill the elephant and in doing so exposes the heart of imperialism:

"Afterwards, of course, there were endless discussions about the shooting of the elephant. The owner was furious, but he was only an Indian and could do nothing. Besides, legally I had done the right thing, for a mad elephant has to be killed, like a mad dog, if its owner fails to control it. Among the Europeans opinion was divided. The older men said I was right, the younger men said it was a damn shame to shoot an elephant for killing a coolie, because an elephant was worth more than any damn Coringhee coolie. And afterwards I was very glad that the coolie had been killed; it put me legally in the right and it gave me a sufficient pretext for shooting the elephant. I often wondered whether any of the others grasped that I had done it solely to avoid looking a fool."

The essay is provided on various internet sites, and below I provide one.

It is not so much that the writer was willing to shoot the elephant but rather, he felt as if he must shoot the elephant.  He was surrounded by the native people and he was a representative of the British colonial government; therefore he felt as if he had no other alternative but to shoot the elephant.  He also does not want to appear weak or cowardly so he shoots the elephant even though he does not really want to.  

This story (or essay) highlights the conflicts both sides in a colonial situation have.  For both sides, it is morally debasing and the writer's shooting the elephant exemplifies this situation.

Orwell discovers through this scenario the intense irony of imperial power. As he puts it, by turning tyrant, the white man destroys only "his own freedom." When he approaches the elephant, Orwell is determined not to shoot it. What makes him realise that he will have to shoot it is the crowd that has gathered to watch the show and who expect the elephant to be killed:

But at that moment I glanced round at the crowd that had followed me. It was an immense crowd, two thousand at the least and growing every minute. It blocked the road fro a long distance on either side. I looked at the sea of yellow faces above the garish clothes--faces all happy and excited over this bit of fun, all certain that the elephant was giong to be shot.

Orwell realises at this moment, as he sees these expectant faces looking at him as if he were "a conjuror about to do a trick," that if he did not kill the elephant, he would look ridiculous, which is what the whole imperial endeavour tried to avoid at all times. He feels the "two thousand wills" of the people watching "pressing him forward," urging him to kill the elephant. As such the slaughter of the elephant becomes an eloquent symbol of the futility of the colonial endeavour.

The narrator in George Orwell’s “Shooting an Elephant” is compelled to shoot the elephant by the energy of the Burmese people and his own fear of retribution. As he struggles with whether or not he wants to or needs to shoot the animal, the narrator illustrates the driving force of the crowd behind him. Even though he took the rifle with no intention of shooting it, he claims “I could feel their two thousand wills pressing me forward, irresistibly.” From this moment he describes the realization that the Western white man’s attempt to rule over the East is futile. He realizes that in trying to maintain power and control, he must do what is expected by the native Burmese people. “. . . in fact I was only an absurd puppet pushed to and fro by the will of those yellow faces behind,” he says of the crowd’s compelling influence.

Just before the narrator takes aim to shoot the elephant, he recognizes his fear of the fallout if he does not shoot it. Because a man is already dead and now the crowd is energized for the kill, the narrator cannot let them down by failing to shoot. He knows that if he fails now, “those […] Burmans would see me pursued, caught, trampled on and reduced to a grinning corpse . . .” To avoid the wrath of an angry mob, he decides to go through with shooting the elephant.

“Shooting an Elephant.” The Literature Network. Jalic Inc., 2000-2016. Web. 30 March 2016.

The British police officer does not want to shoot the elephant but feels compelled to remain resolute and callous in front of the Burmese natives, which is why he ends up killing the elephant against his will. As an agent and representative of the British Empire, the officer is forced to act composed, resolute, and authoritative at all times. As the officer searches for the elephant throughout the village, a crowd begins to follow him and anticipates him shooting the beast. When the British officer discovers the elephant, it is peacefully grazing and no longer a threat. However, a massive crowd has formed behind him, and the officer experiences immense peer pressure to shoot the elephant. He then experiences an epiphany, and Orwell writes,

I perceived in this moment that when the white man turns tyrant it is his own freedom that he destroys. He becomes a sort of hollow, posing dummy, the conventionalized figure of a sahib. For it is the condition of his rule that he shall spend his life in trying to impress the “natives,” and so in every crisis he has got to do what the “natives” expect of him. He wears a mask, and his face grows to fit it (8).

The officer then raises his gun and shoots the harmless elephant against his will to "impress" the natives and live up to his status as a representative of the British Empire. The British officer also does not want to look like a fool in front of the Burmese natives and becomes a victim of the British tyranny he represents.

At first, the narrator in this story states that he has no intention of killing the elephant. He picks up his gun, which is really too small to shoot an elephant with, as an act of good faith and in an attempt to calm the Burmese. When he sees the man who has been killed by the elephant, the skin stripped from his back, he seems to change his mind somewhat. He sends an orderly to borrow an elephant rifle, clearly thinking at this juncture that he may need to "defend [him]self if necessary." However, at the point of seeing the elephant, he is filled with "perfect certainty" that he should not shoot him.

What changes his mind fully is the sight of the crowd around him. This crowd is "immense," thousands of people all watching the narrator as if he is about to perform a trick. He knows he is disliked by them, but that for now he has the power to do something entertaining for him—they "expect" him to shoot the elephant, and therefore he realizes that he has to do it. He recognizes that the crowd is, while unarmed, much bigger than he is, and ultimately he is their puppet after all. He, supposedly the white "sahib," is actually beholden to the will of the people he is supposedly ruling.

I assume what you want to know is why George Orwell wrote "Shooting an Elephant." While there is no particular occasion which prompted this essay, Orwell writes this autobiographical work as a kind of continuation or addendum to his work Burmese Days. Orwell's views on Imperialism were quite well known, so this essay would not have been a surprising thing for him to write. 

Orwell's essay is set in Burma (formerly Myanmar) at a time (1931) when Burma is under the control of the British. He writes about his time working for the Indian Civil Service as a member of the Imperial Police. It was a job he despised, as he sympathized with the Indians:

Theoretically – and secretly, of course – I was all for the Burmese and all against their oppressors, the British.

Orwell recounts an experience in which he is forced to shoot an elephant because it is what was expected of him. The elephant has gone wild and is doing damage in the city; something must be done. Though Orwell does not want to shoot the creature, the natives are so hostile that he feels compelled to shoot the elephant just to save face and maintain his authority. The entire incident is a portrait of the distrust and resentment which both the natives (the Indians) and the authorities (their British oppressors, according to the people and, it seems, to Orwell) experience on a daily basis. 

This essay created a flurry of controversy about whether Orwell was writing an apology for British authoritarian rule or a condemnation of it. Both sides say he did not go far enough neither his apology nor in his condemnation. This fact suggests that perhaps Orwell just wanted people to experience his dilemma as an unwilling oppressor. 

Here was I, the white man with his gun, standing in front of the unarmed native crowd – seemingly the leading actor of the piece; but in reality I was only an absurd puppet pushed to and fro by the will of those yellow faces behind.

In either case, it is clear that Orwell believed both parties were trapped in their roles. 

The young police officer who is based on Orwell and his own experiences in Myanmar is compelled to act by a number of factors, all of which are completely out of his control.  When called to the scene, he realizes that he can choose not to shoot the elephant as the animal is at rest and not currently a threat to anyone.  He could wait for the elephant's owner to return, but the pressure of the crowd to do something is intense.  Some want a spectacle; others want a piece of the animal for feed their families.  Many in the crowd see this incident as a test of the police officer and of their ability to control him.  The officer, being British and a representative of the British Empire, has the power and authority, but it becomes clear to him and the crowd that he is subject to their power in their sheer number.  If the officer shoots the elephant, the crowd will be satisfied, and the officer will maintain his position. If he does not shoot he will be seen as weak and impotent.  As such he becomes a symbol for the entire rot and decay of the empire, a force capable of intimidating those under its reign but in no way in real control.  The great justification for shooting the elephant is that it has killed a man, but even that is false justification.  The officer has no respect for the dead person, nor we find out do his colleagues who discuss the incident later at the station.  The British saw the dead citien as far less important than the elephant.  To save the empire the officer has only one choice: kill the elephant and calm the crowd.  The killing does not come easy, however.  He pours shot after shot into the elephant yet the animal refuses to die for a long time.  The elephant becomes a symbol for the entire empire.  To save the empire its adherents must take actions that ultimately destroy the empire.  What an interesting conundrum.

“I had done it solely to avoid looking a fool.”

The final statement of the autobiographical sketch ‘Shooting an Elephant’ is the answer to this question.  To the natives of Burma, the author is the representative of the mighty British Empire. So he must act in a way that’s impressive as well as that is expected of a sahib.

To understand this better, one must speculate what the situation would have been had he not shot at the giant elephant. The author had been posted as a sub-divisional police officer in Burma, then a colony of the British Empire. Although he may be a strong condemner of British imperialism, he is still a representative of what he strongly despises.

Seeing the mutilated body of a villager, he sends an attendant to fetch an elephant rifle. He does so merely for self protection without any intention to kill the big animal. Seeing him with the gun, the villagers start following him, cheerfully expecting to witness the shooting of an elephant by a sahib. In no time the crowd multiplies to thousands. When he locates the elephant, he is relieved to find it grazing peacefully and harmlessly in a field. It’s no longer savage. The villagers are out of danger and so he must go back to the police station without causing the animal any harm.

But to the author’s stupefaction, over two thousand people have flocked to the place. Every eye seems to be expecting the author to fire a shot at the elephant. Backing away is not possible for him. If he does so, he would make himself ridiculous. He is a sahib and,

“A sahib has got to act like a sahib; he has got to appear resolute, to know his own mind and do definite things.”

An undue pressure seems to be mounting upon him. His position demands that he must “impress natives” and act in accordance with their expectations. His sympathy for the huge animal, his logic for not shooting the elephant and his strong reluctance to spare it can’t prevent him from shooting down the harmless large creature. Quite helplessly and against his wishes, he opens fire at the gigantic animal merely to avoid being laughed at and taken lightly.

Shortly after seeing the dead man's body, the British officer sends for an elephant rifle in case he is forced to defend himself against the massive beast. When the British officer finally receives the elephant rifle, a large crowd of Burmese natives begins following him in hopes of witnessing a spectacle. As the crowd gathers and grows larger, the British officer mentions that he has no intention of shooting the elephant and plans on merely using the rifle to scare the animal if necessary. When the British officer eventually discovers the elephant, it is peacefully grazing by itself, and the officer mentions that it looked "no more dangerous than a cow." The British officer immediately realizes that he should refrain from shooting the elephant for several reasons. A working elephant is an expensive animal, which is comparable to a piece of machinery, and shooting it would be extremely costly to its owner. The elephant's must had worn off and it was in a tranquil, peaceful state. Despite realizing that the elephant is costly and harmless, the British officer ends up shooting the elephant against his will to avoid looking like a fool.

When Orwell actually arrives at the location where the supposedly rogue elephant is to be found, it is immediately clear to him that he should not shoot the elephant. There are plenty of reasons that he gives for this, as he is able to look more objectively upon the matter than the crowds of Burmese around him who want him to shoot the elephant. Note what he says:

It is a serious matter to shoot a working elephant--it is comparable to destroying a huge and costly piece of machinery--and obviously one ought not to do it if it can possibly be avoided. And at that distance, peacefully eating, the elephant looked no more dangerous than a cow.

The two main reasons that Orwell gives for not wanting to shoot the elephant are therefore the way in which, for the Burmese, an elephant was considered not a wild animal, but a tool, or a means of livelihood, and therefore it was a "huge and costly piece of machinery." Secondly, Orwell also feels that the elephant does not at all look like it is dangerous. On the contrary, he compares it to a cow to emphasise how peaceful and tranquil it appears, These are two very strong reasons for not wanting to kill the elephant, and it is obvious that there appears to be no need to kill it.

Orwell (Eric Blair) is speaking of a real life experience of his when stationed in Burma. The elephant run "must" was indeed a real danger; it had even killed a "coolie" (worker)and was likely to go on the rampage again.

Under these circumstances, killing the elephant was not as aberrant as Orwell makes it out to be. However, he is clear in stating that his real motive was to meet the native people's expectations - to put an end to the situation at hand and to demonstrate and assert his power of control, representative and otherwise. So he shot it rather than waiting out the ordeal to see if the elephant could be brought under control otherwise.

I have wondered if Orwell didn't take such an arbitrary position against his own decision just to have a "meaty" essay to write. Misgivings and even growing resentment against British incursion  (via colonisation) into Burmese affairs were the order of the day. Owell himself withdrew from military service and eventually took an adamant stance against imperialism under the British flag.