The Elephant Vanishes (Plot Summary)

Plot Summary

"The Elephant Vanishes" begins with the narrator recalling how he read in the newspaper about the disappearance of an elephant from his town's elephant house. The narrator, who remains unnamed throughout the story, describes his daily routine, which includes reading the newspaper from start to finish. He then describes the article that tells about the elephant's mysterious disappearance the day before. He notes that according to the article, both the elephant and its keeper have vanished leaving authorities baffled.

The narrator interrupts his description of the newspaper article to relate how the elephant had come to be adopted by the town a year earlier. He recalls that when financial problems caused a private zoo to shut down, the zoo's other animals had been placed in various zoos throughout Japan. However, because the elephant was so old, other zoos would not take it, so the elephant remained in the abandoned zoo until an agreement was reached among various parties in the town. The parties included a high-rise condo developer who had bought the land where the old zoo had stood, the mayor of the town, and the former zoo's owners. The narrator describes the negotiations among the parties, as well as opposition to the plan by opponents of the mayor, who eventually accepted the new plan.

The narrator notes that the debate about the elephant problem concluded with the town's taking charge of the ancient elephant and relocating it to an elementary school's old gym, which was located in a clearing in a wooded area. The elephant's aged keeper from the zoo also came to live in a small, prefab house next to the elephant, so he could continue to tend to the animal's needs.

The narrator goes on to humorously recall the elephant-house dedication ceremony. He describes in detail how the elephant was secured to a concrete slab by a heavy steel chain and shackle around its right rear leg. He describes the keeper as "not an unfriendly" old man who maintained a close, mysterious bond with the elephant that the narrator futilely tried to understand.

The narrator then says that after a year of living in the new location, being visited by elementary school children and others, the elephant completely vanished without warning. Resuming his description of the newspaper article about the elephant's disappearance, the narrator says how odd he finds the article to be. He attributes the article's strangeness to the reporter's efforts to maintain a neutral, objective tone, while clearly being confused by the absurdity of the situation.

The narrator then gives three reasons why the elephant could not have escaped — in spite of the reporter's use of this wording — but instead had to have vanished. The narrator points out that the steel cuff binding the elephant had been found still locked in the house and that this improbable event had occurred in spite of the fact that the keys to the cuff were kept in locked safes in police headquarters and the firehouse. The narrator notes that both keys were found in their respective safes after the elephant's disappearance.

The narrator also points out that the elephant house had been surrounded by a massive fence consisting of heavy iron bars almost ten feet high. In addition, the only entrance to this enclosure had been found locked from the inside after the elephant's disappearance. The third strange circumstance the narrator describes is the lack of elephant tracks. He notes that a steep hill occupied the back of the elephant house, so that the only route of escape would have been a path at the front of the house, which completely lacked elephant prints in its soft earth. Following his listing of these circumstances, the narrator reiterates that the elephant could not have escaped but had to have vanished.

The narrator adds, however, that the mayor, the reporter, and the police would not openly admit that the elephant had vanished and that the police were investigating the incident. He recalls how the mayor held a news conference defending the elephant security system and denouncing the persons responsible for the elephant's disappearance. The narrator describes news coverage of the event, which called for citizens knowing anything about the incident to come forward. As he drinks his second cup of morning coffee, the narrator thinks about telling the authorities what he knows but decides against contacting the police, as he thinks they would never believe him.

The narrator then recalls how he cut out the elephant article and pasted it into a scrapbook he fastidiously keeps of all the articles about the elephant. He relates how he watched the seven-o'clock news, which showed hunters with rifles, Self-Defense troops, police, and firemen searching for the elephant in the woods and hills of the Tokyo suburb where the narrator resides. The narrator states that although the search took several days, the authorities were unable to find a single clue concerning the elephant's whereabouts. As he recalls reading and pasting all the news clippings into his scrapbook, the narrator talks about the pointlessness of the articles, which reveal nothing substantial about the incident. He states that over many months, interest in the incident waned as the elephant case fell into the category of "unsolvable mysteries." In spite of the reduction of general interest in the elephant story, the narrator says that he continued to visit the old elephant house whenever he got a chance. He describes the thick chain around the gate and "the air of doom and desolation" that hung over the empty space.

In the final part of the story, the narrator recalls meeting an editor of a magazine for young housewives several months after the elephant's disappearance. The narrator meets the editor at a party his company is throwing to launch its new line of kitchen appliances. Since the narrator is in charge of the company's publicity campaign, he shows the editor around the display, and he explains the principle of unity governing the design of the kitchen appliance line. The editor questions the importance of unity in a kitchen and asks the narrator what his personal opinion of the matter is. He declines to answer until he's off work and says how "things you can't sell don't count for much" in the pragmatic world in which they live.

After debating whether the world is indeed pragmatic, the editor and the narrator continue to flirt and talk over champagne and later over drinks in the hotel's cocktail lounge. Although the conversation flows smoothly at first and the narrator recalls being drawn to the editor, he notes that things took a turn when he brought up the topic of the elephant. He immediately regrets bringing up the subject, but the editor presses him for more details when he says he was probably not shocked by the elephant's disappearance. After balking a moment, the narrator tells the editor what he knows about the elephant.

He tells the editor that he is probably the last person to see the elephant before it disappeared, as he saw the elephant after the zoo closed that evening. The narrator explains that he had sometimes watched the elephant and the keeper through an air vent in the elephant house's roof, which was visible from a spot on a cliff behind the house. He recalls how impressed he had been by the obvious trust and affection the elephant and the keeper displayed when they were out of the public eye.

When the editor asks him whether he always liked elephants, the narrator admits that he did, although he is not sure why. The editor also asks him if there was anything unusual about the elephant or the keeper on the night of the disappearance. After hesitating, the narrator says there was and there wasn't. He goes on to explain that although the keeper and the elephant were doing the same things they always did, the balance in size between the two of them had changed. He tells the editor that either the elephant had shrunk or the keeper had gotten bigger or both simultaneously. When asked, he also admits that he did not tell the police, because he thought they would not believe him and that he would have become a suspect in the case.

When pressed further about the occurrence, the narrator states that he can only say he probably saw the change in appearances, since he does not have any proof of the change actually happening. To himself, he notes that he had the feeling that "a different, chilling kind of time was flowing through the elephant house — but nowhere else."

When the editor asks him whether he believes that the elephant either shrunk until it was small enough to escape or dissolved into nothing, the narrator again hesitates and says he does not know what happened and that it is impossible for him to imagine events beyond what he thinks he saw. Following this revelation about the elephant, the conversation between the editor and the narrator becomes awkward, and they part outside the hotel.

The narrator says that that was the last time he saw the editor. Although he considered asking her out for dinner, he ended up not doing so due to a sense of emotional paralysis that he experiences after the elephant's vanishing. The story ends with the narrator describing his unease following the incident and how in spite of succeeding more than ever in his job, he feels bewildered and permanently unsettled. He comments that the papers print almost nothing now about the elephant and that the elephant and its keeper will never return.

Media Adaptations

• The Elephant Vanishes was adapted as a play by Simon McBurney and performed at the Setagaya Public Theatre in June of 2003. A description of the adaptation of the book to the stage appears online at http://www.ums.org under the title "An Elephant's Long Journey," written by Jay Rubin, one of Murakami's translators.
• The publisher Random House maintains an official Murakami website at http://www.randomhouse.com/features/murakami which features ample information about the author, his books, and other online resources pertaining to Murakami.