Mowgli’s Brothers by Rudyard Kipling Shere Khan as a positive character

 Mowgli’s Brothers by Rudyard Kipling

Shere Khan as a positive character

 

There are various ways to look at animals. In fear, in awe, with suspicion, interest or just as things that need to disappear, before we take all we can and use for food, remedies or whatever.

The approach of Kipling is an interesting, if ancient one. Ever since man climbed down from the trees and started to talk, he has attributed various magical powers, communication abilities to animals.

Some animals have been worshipped. As the alpha male in my pack, I have some control over a pack of borzois, a couple of Macaws and none at all in what concerns Ndugu the Burmese cat.

Animals communicate. That is a fact.

It is also clear that Kipling had a wonderful and wild imagination.

Mowgli is the man cub, that has fascinated most of us as the hero of the Jungle Book, and here in the short story that I am not sure what role has played.

Was it the first sketch of the Jungle Book?

Is included as I see on the net, in the larger story?

I had included in Essential Kipling, together with other short stories and some poems.

It would be interesting to know how Kipling arrived at his organization of animals.

Take Shere Khan, the tiger. Why is he the villain? It probably has to do with the fact that the mentality was different then, when tigers were shot in their thousands. What am I saying, even if there are few left, in the rural places where they still exist, they are still seen as nothing more than a pest to be eradicated.

But the wolves? Why are they the good guys? After all, their image was also terrible, if for the wrong reasons- the idea that man is the definitive ruler and all else needs to disappear to make room for him, albeit that will end up affecting this very “ruler of the planet”.

Wolves have been exterminated in the USA, and even today, where they have returned, the farmers are very keen on destroying them.

On the other hand, Romulus and Remus have been fed by the famous wolf, whose statue adorns squares in Italy and in my country.

The idea of the law of the jungle is also original in The Jungle Book. We generally mean by the law of the jungle a place where the bigger eats the smaller, but Kipling has another version, which seems to use some human principles or virtues to explain some attitudes of animals.

Akela is the alpha wolf and at one point, there is to be a final fight, whereby he points out that it will have to be one by one.

Anyone who has seen dogs fight, or wolves for that matter is aware that they tend to all join in and it is a “wild” kerfuffle and not an organized affair.

This is not to criticize what is meant to be fiction. I am saying Kipling needed to be a kind of ancient Attenborough, watching the animals and then writing his natural life notes.

As an animal lover I am just wondering how The Jungle Book worked out in the mind of Kipling, in the knowledge that the Animal World is a bewildering, fabulous realm, where interaction is complex and fascinating.

I have a couple of splendid macaws who try to communicate with the rest of the flock: with each other, with their human companions: Puccini says hello and Hannah, Balzac says papa and salut, oui and some other words. Puccini is still a baby and we’ll have to wait and see what else comes up.

But when they try to interact with the borzois, it doesn’t work, even if the imperial dogs are keen on interacting with the cat. The macaws try to approach the borzois, but it never comes to anything else except the small, occasional pulling of a few hairs.

Why don’t they do like in The Jungle Book and talk issues with each other?

The borzois have ostracized the macaw, and if I were not always present (or my spouse, or daughter) the borzois might end up hurting a too insistent macaw.

In other words- we have the Jungle Book performance, everyday, at our house.