Home | Books By Year | Books from 2008
The Elephant's Journey
Buy The Elephant's Journey now from AmazonFirst, read the Wikipedia article. Then, scroll down to see what other TopShelfReviews readers thought about the book. And once you've experienced the book, tell everyone what you thought about it.
Wikipedia article
'The Elephant's Journey' is a novel by Nobel Prize-winning author Jos Saramago. It was first published in 2008 with an English translation in 2010.
Plot
In 1551, King Joo III of Portugal gave Archduke Maximilian an unusual wedding present: an elephant named Solomon or Suleiman. This elephant's journey from Lisbon to Vienna was witnessed and remarked upon by scholars, historians, and ordinary people.http://www.suleymantheelephant.ch/index2.html Out of this material, Jos Saramago has spun a novel already heralded as "a triumph of language, imagination, and humor" (El Pas).
Solomon and his keeper, Subhro, begin in dismal conditions, forgotten in a corner of the palace grounds. When it occurs to the king and queen that an elephant would be an appropriate wedding gift, everyone rushes to get them ready: Subhro is given two new suits of clothes and Solomon a long overdue scrub. They cross the border into Spain at Castelo Rodrigo and meet the Archduke at Valladolid.
Accompanied by the Archduke, his new wife, the royal guard, Soloman and Subhro cross a continent riven by the Reformation and civil wars. They make their way through the storied cities of northern Italy: Genoa, Piacenza, Mantua, Verona, Venice, and Trento, where the Council of Trent is in session. They brave the Alps and the terrifying Isarco and Brenner Passes; they sail from Rosas across the Mediterranean Sea and later up the Inn River (elephants, it turns out, are natural sailors). At last they make their grand entry into the imperial city. The Elephant's Journey is a tale of friendship and adventure.
Topics
Saramago shows the sentimental side of all people and animals, regardless of their social status. The characters are thus full of different nuances, such as the ignorance of kings, the convenient flexibility of a cleric in the middle of the night, the intelligence of a mahout to sell elephant hair to alleviate any evil.
Editions
The novel was translated into English by Margaret Jull Costa and published in 2010.
Awards and recognitions
*2009 So Paulo Prize for Literature Shortlisted in the Best Book of the Year category (Portuguese original)
*2011 Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize Winner (English translation).[http://www.st-annes.ox.ac.uk/about/oxford-weidenfeld-translation-prize/prevwinners.html Previous winners]
References
Category:Novels by Jos Saramago
Category:2008 novels
Category:21st-century Portuguese novels
Category:Lisbon in fiction
Category:Books about elephants
Category:Novels set in Spain
Category:Novels set in Italy
Category:Novels set in Vienna
Category:Novels set in the 1550s
Buy The Elephant's Journey now from Amazon
<-- Return to books from 2008