George Orwell, best known for his novels Animal Farm (1945) and Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), uses his characteristic transparent writing style to record an anecdote staff of "A Hanging" ' taken to a Burmese prison camp where he worked during the British colonial era. Although not explicitly stated, the narrative demonstrates the process of cyclical desensitization to acts of injustice due to intentional self-blinding combined with the subconscious effect of embedded social norms. Orwell shows that his recognition of these processes evolves over the course of the narrative through the use of characters and metonymies. Although the story presents the non-fiction events as they unfolded from beginning to end, Orwell's piece shows the literary techniques used to 'move' his readers, thus making it a work of power over knowledge. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay From the first paragraph onwards, it is immediately apparent how detached the penal institution workers were from the detained prisoners. “We waited outside the condemned cells, a row of barracks with double bars, like cages for small animals. These were the convicts, who would be hanged within the next week or two.” This excerpt suggests that the prisoners were identified by the writer simply as animals raised for slaughter (p.1.). Orwell also shows that the poor treatment of the prisoners was indifferent to him through the fact that he shows their poor living conditions but never comments on them, a point further supported by the introduction of the main protagonist. Although the condemned man was destined for death, Orwell reports only the physical appearance of his central figure: "He was a Hindu, a frail man, with a shaved head and vague liquid eyes... thick trimmed moustaches, absurdly too large for his body". The writer clearly shows his lack of concern about “who” he was driving to their death by never mentioning information about the criminal's thoughts or what he was convicted of (p.1.). If Orwell had grown up with morals against murder and did not know the prisoner's crime, then it can be inferred that the author's contempt for his prisoner may have been shaped by his own self-numbing mechanisms, along with what the law he applied communicated as "wrong" and "right". Taking inspiration from the Darwinian theory of evolution, the mentality of the imperialist era was that the Anglo-Saxons were the sovereign race. Being upper class Europeans, no doubt this ideology had an impact on the writer and his colleagues, especially the superintendent who declared while looking at the time: “For God's sake, hurry up, Francis,” he said irritably. “The man should have been dead by now. Aren't you ready yet?" Orwell makes known the superintendent's previous profession as a military doctor and, combined with his high rank, he was supposedly the most experienced in witnessing death. It is no surprise that this character was virtually impervious to sensitivities about the topic, as shown in his harsh dialogue (p.1.). Thus, being an example of the extent to which a human being can detach himself from emotions towards killing, the next symbolic character presented, however, is free from the imprint of westernized caste system and therefore provides an interpretation of the prisoner without prejudice. The first metonymy comes in the appearance of "a large woolly dog, half Airedale, half pariah" on the symbol towards the gallows and creates aplayful contradiction with the dark tone previously set (p.2.). “He came bounding among us with a loud barrage of barks, and jumped around us wriggling his whole body, wild with joy at finding so many human beings together.” According to the superintendent, the dog shows how social hierarchy can influence perspective (p.2.). The animal, not being part of a social system, did not understand what was happening. In his innocence he did not see a group of men marching alongside an illegitimate, but a group of men marching. The dog confirms that he saw all the men as equals when "he ran towards the prisoner and, jumping up, tried to lick his face". Despite the interruption of the formal procession by the dog, Orwell continues to illustrate the prisoner's death march as a seamless process, different from that of a murder (p.2.). The description of the inmate's systematic walk illustrates that everything ran in "business as usual fashion." With each step his muscles slid perfectly into place, the tuft of hair on his scalp danced up and down, his feet they printed on wet gravel." It was only when the subject actively avoided walking in a puddle that the author began to see the impending hanging as a heinous act about to take place rather than as a chore or standard procedure to be dealt with ( p.2.) aside from losing the puddle it is a curious action to take while walking towards your death and serves as a moral climax for Orwell who then realizes “what it means to destroy a healthy and conscious man When I saw the prisoner step aside to avoid the puddle, I saw the mystery, the unspeakable mistake of cutting short a life when it is in full tide. This man was not dying, he was alive just as we were alive." Through the testimony that this man, who seemed so disabled, was still able to perform elementary acts of reasoning, the author was able to identify the prisoner in a way corresponding to the dog's temperament, stating: "He and we were a group of men walking together, seeing, hearing, feeling, understanding the same world; and in two minutes, with a sudden snap, one of us would be gone: one less mind, one less world the puddle affected Orwell personally, the lynching itself clearly had an impact on the other participants (p.2.) Although the hangings occurred weekly, the author showed that the “repeated cry of 'Ram Ram! !” to his god, it disturbed the workers (except the superintendent) who shared the opinion of “get it over with, enough of that abominable noise!” The moment of the fall serves as a physical climax in the piece and the negative effect this particular hanging had on the prison guards can be seen through the text: “Everyone had changed color. The Indians had turned gray like bad coffee and one or two bayonets wavered. Orwell states that, after witnessing the atrocities of mankind, even the dog “did he retreated to a corner of the yard, where he remained among the weeds, looking at us fearfully.” Whether the workers began to see in the prisoner the same features seen by Orwell, or whether they were simply shocked by the man's unusual cries, all the characters evidently they felt disturbed (p.3.) This point can be further confirmed by the men celebrating with each other to reaffirm that what they had done was okay. The celebration marks the end of the narrative but also serves as the beginning of a new cycle of desensitization in preparation for next week. It is evident from several lines of the text that everyone wanted to distract themselves not only by drinking, but also by laughing talkatively to.