In "Shooting an Elephant," Orwell doesnt actually begin his narrative until the third paragraph. Why?

The first two paragraphs of this excellent and thought
provoking essay serve to establish the context of the narrative of the shooting of the
elephant, point towards the conflicted feelings that Orwell feels as a colonial officer,
and lastly, indicates the message of the entire essay. In many ways, they are the most
important parts of the entire essay - the actual story of shooting the elephant just
proves what Orwell has already stated.

In these paragraphs,
on the one hand, Orwell had decided that he "was all for the Burmese and all against
their oppressors, the British." Yet, on the other hand, he talks of his "rage against
the evil-spirited little beasts who tried to make my job impossible" and he dreams of
the joy of bayoneting a Buddhist priest. Clearly this irony points towards some
conflicted feelings and the cultural conflicts of
colonialism.

The second paragraph tells us what Orwell
learnt from the elephant narrative and thus points towards the message of the
essay:

One day
something happened which in a roundabout way was enlightening. It was a tiny incident in
itself, but it gave me a better glimpse than I had had before of the real nature of
imperialism - the real motives for which despotic governments
act.

It is these "real
motives" that are explored through the rest of the essay and the way that the actual
power and position that white men assume destroys their own "freedom" and converts them
into "absurd puppets" who are "pushed to and fro by the will of those yellow faces
behind."

Thus the first two paragraphs are crucial for
establishing the setting, establishing the conflicted loyalties of the narrator and
pointing towards the overarching message of this essay.