For example, the article used such expressions as ‘the elephant escaped’ but if you looked at the entire piece it became obvious that the elephant had in no way ‘escaped.’ It had vanished into thin air.”
With the peculiar disappearance of the town elephant, the main character becomes almost obsessed with the event. There is no explanation of why or how the elephant and its keeper vanished except one that seems mystical and otherworldly. Later in the story, the main character explains how he watched the elephant every day from a cliff near the enclosure. On the day before the elephant is discovered to be missing, the main character describes a change in size of the elephant. It was almost as if the elephant “for one reason or another, shrunk” (464).
THE ELEPHANT VANISHES “Charming, humorous and frequently puzzling The Elephant Vanishes is fun to read. “ — The New York Times “These stories show us Japan as it’s experienced from the inside. They take place in parallel worlds not so much remote from ordinary life as hidden within its surfaces. Even in the slipperiest. Provided to YouTube by The Orchard EnterprisesThe Elephant Vanishes Fumi TomitaThe Elephant Vanishes: Jazz Interpretations of the Short Stories of Haruki M.
In the Buddha religion, an elephant can symbolize good luck. Maybe the elephant in this story shows that luck is a very fleeting thing and that one must not rely on it too often. Luck is something that is common but very hard to explain. Many people see luck as God helping them and others see it as the universe positively working for them. Whatever one’s belief, luck can “vanish” very much like the elephant in this story. The size of the elephant getting smaller and smaller can be symbolism for luck running out for a person after they relied on it too much.
The Elephant Vanishes (象の消滅, Zō no shōmetsu) is a collection of 17 short stories by Japanese author Haruki Murakami.The stories were written between 1980 and 1991, and published in Japan in various magazines, then collections. The Elephant Vanishes: Stories Questions and Answers. The Question and Answer section for The Elephant Vanishes: Stories is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel. Ask Your Own Question.
The Elephant Vanishes: Stories, p.1
The Elephant Vanishes Book Review
Haruki MurakamiThe Elephant Vanishes Year
Acclaim for HARUKI MURAKAMI’S
THE ELEPHANT VANISHES
“Charming, humorous and frequently puzzling … The Elephant Vanishes [is] fun to read. “
— The New York Times
“These stories show us Japan as it’s experienced from the inside…. [They] take place in parallel worlds not so much remote from ordinary life as hidden within its surfaces…. Even in the slipperiest of Mr. Murakami’s stories, pinpoints of detail flash out … warm with life, hopelessly — and wonderfully — unstable.”
— The New York Times Book Review
“A stunning writer at work in an era of international literature.”
— Newsday
“Murakami is one of the great Japanese masters, and his style is sexy, funny, mysterious, and always coolly deadpan.”
— Details
“Enchanting … intriguing … all of these tales have a wonderfully surreal quality and a hip, witty tone. Mr. Murakami has pulled off a tricky feat, writing stories about people who are bored but never boring. He left me lying awake at night, hungry for more.”
— Wall Street Journal
“What’s unique to Murakami’s stories is that they manage to kindle up all sorts of feelings at once…. Reading The Elephant Vanishes leaves you wanting more.”
— Philadelphia Inquirer
“The Elephant Vanishes, through [its] bold originality and charming surrealism, should win the author new readers in this country.”
— Detroit Free Press
CONTENTS
THE WIND-UP BIRD AND TUESDAY’S WOMEN
THE SECOND BAKERY ATTACK
THE KANGAROO COMMUNIQUÉ
ON SEEING THE 100% PERFECT GIRL ONE BEAUTIFUL APRIL MORNING
SLEEP
THE FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, THE 1881 INDIAN UPRISING, HITLER’S INVASION OF POLAND, AND THE REALM OF RAGING WINDS
LEDERHOSEN
BARN BURNING
THE LITTLE GREEN MONSTER
FAMILY AFFAIR
A WINDOW
TV PEOPLE
A SLOW BOAT TO CHINA
THE DANCING DWARF
THE LAST LAWN OF THE AFTERNOON
THE SILENCE
THE ELEPHANT VANISHES
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
OTHER BOOKS BY THIS AUTHOR
ALSO BY HARUKI MURAKAMI
I’M IN THE KITCHEN cooking spaghetti when the woman calls. Another moment until the spaghetti is done; there I am, whistling the prelude to Rossini’s La Gazza Ladra along with the FM radio. Perfect spaghetti-cooking music.
I hear the telephone ring but tell myself, Ignore it. Let the spaghetti finish cooking. It’s almost done, and besides, Claudio Abbado and the London Symphony Orchestra are coming to a crescendo. Still, on second thought, I figure I might as well turn down the flame and head into the living room, cooking chopsticks in hand, to pick up the receiver. It might be a friend, it occurs to me, possibly with word of a new job.
“I want ten minutes of your time,” comes a woman’s voice out of the blue.
“Excuse me?” I blurt back in surprise. “How’s that again?”
“I said, just ten minutes of your time, that’s all I want,” the woman repeats.
I have absolutely no recollection of ever hearing this woman’s voice before. And I pride myself on a near-perfect ear for voices, so I’m sure there’s no mistake. This is the voice of a woman I don’t know. A soft, low, nondescript voice.
“Pardon me, but what number might you have been calling?” I put on my most polite language.
“What difference does that make? All I want is ten minutes of your time. Ten minutes to come to an understanding.” She cinches the matter quick and neat.
“Come to an understanding?”
“Of our feelings,” says the woman succinctly.
I crane my neck back through the door I’ve left open to peer into the kitchen. A plume of white steam rising cheerfully from the spaghetti pot, and Abbado is still conducting his Gazza.
“If you don’t mind, I’ve got spaghetti on right now. It’s almost done, and it’ll be ruined if I talk with you for ten minutes. So I’m going to hang up, all right?”
“Spaghetti?” the woman sputters in disbelief. “It’s only ten-thirty in the morning. What are you doing cooking spaghetti at ten-thirty in the morning? Kind of strange, don’t you think?”
“Strange or not, what’s it to you?” I say. “I hardly had any breakfast, so I was getting hungry right about now. And as long as I do the cooking, when and what I eat is my own business, is it not?”
“Well, whatever you say. Hang up, then,” says the woman in a slow, sappy trickle of a voice. A peculiar voice. The slightest emotional shift and her tone switches to another frequency. “I’ll call back later.”
“Now, wait just one minute,” I stammer. “If you’re selling something, you can forget right now about calling back. I’m unemployed at present and can’t afford to buy anything.”
“I know that, so don’t give it another thought,” says the woman.
“You know that? You know what?”
“That you’re unemployed, of course. That much I knew. So cook your spaghetti and let’s get on with it, okay?”
“Hey, who the—” I launch forth, when suddenly the phone goes dead. Cut me off. Too abruptly to have set down the receiver; she must have pressed the button with her finger.
I’m left hanging. I stare blankly at the receiver in my hand and only then remember the spaghetti. I put down the receiver and return to the kitchen. Turn off the gas, empty the spaghetti into a colander, top it with tomato sauce I’ve heated in a saucepan, then eat. It’s overcooked, thanks to that pointless telephone call. No matter of life-and-death, nor am I in any mood to fuss over the subtleties of cooking spaghetti—I’m too hungry. I simply listen to the radio playing send-off music for two hundred fifty grams of spaghetti as I eagerly dispatch every last strand to my stomach.
I wash up plate and pans while boiling a kettle of water, then pour a cup for a tea bag. As I drink my tea, I think about that phone call.
So we could come to an understanding?
What on earth did that woman mean, calling me up like that? And who on earth was she?
The whole thing is a mystery. I can’t recall any woman ever telephoning me before without identifying herself, nor do I have the slightest clue what she could have wanted to talk about.
What the hell, I tell myself, what do I care about understanding some strange woman’s feelings, anyway? What possible good could come of it? What matters now is that I find a job. Then I can settle into a new life cycle.
Yet even as I return to the sofa to resume the Len Deighton novel I took out of the library, the mere glimpse out of the corner of my eye of the telephone sets my mind going. Just what were those feelings that would take ten minutes to come to an understanding about? I mean, really, ten minutes to come to an understanding of our feelings?
Come to think of it, the woman specified precisely ten minutes right from the start. Seems she was quite certain about that exact amount of time. As if nine minutes would have been too short, eleven minutes maybe too long. Just like for spaghetti al dente.
What with these thoughts running through my head, I lose track of the plot of the novel. So I decide to do a few quick exercises, perhaps iron a shirt or two. Whenever things get in a muddle, I always iron shirts. A habit of long standing with me.
I divide the shirt-ironing process into twelve steps total: from (1) Collar