The Elephant Vanishes: Stories

Fiction | Short Story Collection | Adult | Published in 1993

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“The Elephant Vanishes”Chapter Summaries & Analyses

“The Elephant Vanishes” Summary

The narrator reads about the disappearance of an elderly elephant in the local newspaper. The article outlines the unusual circumstances of the elephant’s disappearance: The elephant’s shackle was found at the elephant house still locked, and the elephant’s keeper is also missing.

The narrator, who has had a special interest in the elephant for years, recounts how the elephant was adopted by his town after a local zoo was closed. The elephant and his keeper—who has cared for the elephant for the last decade and who is clearly very close to the elephant—were put up in an elephant house at the edge of the town.

The narrator reflects on the case of the missing elephant, concluding that the only explanation is that the elephant has simply vanished. He realizes, though, that nobody will admit that this is really the only explanation. Time passes, meanwhile, and the elephant is not found, despite the fact that search parties scour the area. Eventually, the townspeople lose interest in the case. The narrator continues visiting the empty elephant house, though, noting how sad the place seems now.

The narrator, who works in the public relations department of an electrical appliance company, meets a magazine editor at a company party. He talks to her about his company’s appliances and their ideas about unity in a kitchen. As the two talk, they realize that they enjoy each other’s company. Later, while having a drink at a cocktail lounge, the narrator mentions the elephant. Though he immediately regrets raising the subject, the woman coaxes him into telling him how he interprets the case.

The narrator finally admits that he saw the elephant the night before it disappeared, and was probably the last person to do so. He explains that he found a hidden spot on a hill from which he could clearly see into the elephant house, and that he used to go there sometimes to observe the elephant and his keeper. The night before the elephant was reported missing, the narrator was at this spot looking into the elephant house. He tells the woman that he remembered feeling that the “balance” (324) between the elephant and his keeper had shifted, as though they were shrinking in size. The woman asks if he thinks that the elephant and his keeper shrank until they simply vanished from existence. The narrator responds noncommittally, saying that he does not know. The conversation dies soon after, and the narrator never sees the woman again. Since the elephant vanished, he has felt as though something inside of him has become off-balance.

“The Elephant Vanishes” Analysis

It is appropriate that the collection should take its name from the last story of the collection, “The Elephant Vanishes,” which delves into all three of the collection’s themes: Existential Anxiety in the Modern World, Perception Versus Reality, and Internality and Social Relationships. As a kind of ostensible remedy for his sense of existential anxiety, the narrator fixates on the idea of balance and its relationship to unity. Talking to the magazine editor about his work, the narrator comments that “even the most beautifully designed item dies if it is out of balance with its surroundings” (319)—hence his idea of “unity” in the kitchen. He uses this same principle to explain the vanishing elephant, whose “balance” in relation to his keeper “seemed to have changed somewhat” (325) the night before they disappeared.

The narrator himself expresses concern about “some kind of balance inside” (327) of himself becoming off-kilter at the end of the story. Finding an explanation for the inexplicable—the elephant and its keeper disappeared because the existential relationship of living things depends on this “balance” between them—provides the narrator with a kind of certainty in an uncertain situation. At the end of the story, he even attributes his professional success to the fact that “people are looking for a kind of unity in this kit-chin we know as the world. Unity of design. Unity of color. Unity of function” (327). The vanishing of the elephant is the literalization of this idea of unity or balance—having come out of balance with their surroundings, the elephant and his keeper simply disappeared.

While the narrator’s interactions with the magazine editor indicate a loneliness in his own life, he finds himself drawn to the special bond between the elephant and its keeper, pointing to the theme of Internality and Social Relationships. The elephant and its keeper seem to understand each other perfectly without even needing to communicate in any discernable way. The narrator’s fascination suggests there is something enviable about the intimacy of the elephant and its keeper living together and apparently vanishing out of existence together.

The story also explores the idea of Perception Versus Reality. The disappearance of the elephant appears to defy all logic, and the narrator describes the case in detail to show that the only possible explanation is also ostensibly impossible—namely, that the elephant and its keeper vanished into thin air. The narrator knows there is little use in telling this to anyone, and dismisses the idea of talking to the police: “What good would it do to talk to people like that, who would not even consider the possibility that the elephant had simply vanished?” (317). The narrator even doubts his own senses—his own perception—when he observes the elephant and its keeper seeming to shrink on the night before the disappearance. In the end, he determines he can only know what he has seen. Are the narrator’s perceptions at odds with reality, or is it reason and logic that are doomed to come up short? These are the questions that the story raises, but ultimately, does not answer.