A Hanging

“A Hanging” is an essay written by the English novelist, journalist, essayist, and critic George Orwell (1903-50). It was first published in The Adelphi, a British literary magazine, in 1931. Orwell gained widespread acclaim for his most famous novels, Animal Farm (1945) and Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949). His essays and journalism, like his fiction, explore political themes, societal issues, and the dangers of totalitarianism. “A Hanging” was one of his earliest published works. Indeed, it was originally published under Orwell’s real name, Eric Arthur Blair, rather than his pen name. The essay clearly draws on Orwell’s experiences in Burma as an officer in the British Imperial Police, when he came to despise the cruelty and unfairness of the British Empire. However, it is unclear whether the essay recounts a real, single event. The full text of this essay is freely accessible online on the website of the Orwell Foundation.

The essay describes an early morning execution in Burma. It opens in the jail yard, where “brown and silent” prisoners squat in cells “like small animal cages” (Paragraph 1). These are the cells of condemned men due to be imminently executed. A single Hindu prisoner is prepared to be led out for execution by six Indian guards armed with guns and bayonets. The prisoner is small and “puny” and offers no resistance while he is handcuffed and attached to a chain. He remains silent and impassive as he is led to the gallows.

As the prisoner is led to his death, a bugle from the barracks signals it is eight o’clock. The English superintendent of the jail tries to hurry proceedings, pointing out that the execution should be over by now and is delaying the other prisoners’ breakfast. Francis, the Dravidian head jailer, responds, “All iss satisfactorily prepared. The hangman iss waiting” (Paragraph 4). However, proceedings are disrupted when a stray dog bounds into the yard and jumps up at everybody indiscriminately, trying to lick the prisoner’s face. For a moment, everyone stares at the dog, too horrified to respond. Eventually, the dog is captured, and the narrator uses his scarf as a leash.

The narrator watches the movements of the prisoner’s leg muscles as he walks to the gallows and notices how he steps aside to avoid a puddle. Suddenly, the narrator realizes that the prisoner is another human being who is about to die. For the first time, he recognizes “the unspeakable wrongness of cutting a life short when it is in full tide” (Paragraph 10).

The prisoner reaches the gallows. With his face covered and the noose around his neck, he calls repeatedly and rhythmically to the Hindu god Ram. The sound causes the dog to whine and all those present to exhibit increasing discomfort and impatience. At the superintendent’s signal, the prisoner drops to his death, and the dog escapes the narrator’s grip to run to the back to the gallows and look for him. When the dog sees the dead prisoner, it retreats to a far corner of the yard.

The mood of the party lifts once the execution is over. The other condemned prisoners are led out of their cells to eat their breakfast, and the various native and European officials chat and laugh together. One of the narrator’s companions—a “Eurasian boy”—reveals that the hanged man wet himself when he learned that his appeal had been dismissed. He offers the narrator a cigarette out of his “classy European style” silver cigarette case (Paragraph 18). Francis recalls hangings in the past that went less smoothly. Doctors have occasionally had to pull at a hanging man’s legs to kill him. In another incident, six warders were required to drag a reluctant prisoner from his cell. The narrator finds himself laughing with the others despite his earlier reflections. In a moment of camaraderie, the witnesses to the execution share a drink of whiskey. The narrator closes the essay abruptly by noting that “the dead man was a hundred yards away” (Paragraph 24).