On the wild edge

Several literary classics have had animals as their central characters. Jack London’s The Call of the Wild, for instance. Or the children’s favourite, Black Beauty by Anna Sewell. In her third book (after the critically acclaimed Atlas of the Unknowns and the short story collection Aerogrammes), Tania James places an animal protagonist at the heart of her story. The Tusk That Did The Damage, which is being described as a ‘tour de force’ is the story of the Gravedigger, a traumatised rogue elephant with a penchant for “burying” the bodies of the humans he attacks and kills. Alongside the Gravedigger, James presents the viewpoints of Emma, a documentary filmmaker who is chronicling the forest department’s work with the elephants at a wildlife park; and Manu, a young farmer whose brother is a poacher.

It was in 2011 that James first had the idea that would lead to The Tusk That Did The Damage: Reading Tarquin Hall’s To The Elephant Graveyard, she came across a mention of a real-life elephant who would bury his victims. The “macabre distortion of an (otherwise) tender act” — elephants are known to bury their dead and often return to the burial site — and finding out that it was the result of abuse the pachyderm had suffered at the hands of previous owners, sparked James’ interest in elephant trauma and behaviour.

While she’s always had strong opinions on many of the issues The Tusk That Did The Damage highlights such as species preservation, James researched extensively before writing her story. She met with Vivek Menon, the director of the Wildlife Trust of India, who in turn helped her connect with conservationists, forest officers, farmers in Wayanad, Periyar and even the Kaziranga Wildlife Park (Assam). At the Kodanad Elephant Sanctuary, James interviewed farmers who had been caught in the man-elephant conflict, forest guards and officers, former poachers and elephant keepers.

She also credits Elephants on the Edge by Gay Bradshaw as giving her a deeper understanding of the psychology of pachyderms and how trauma affects them. None of this research, however, is presented in a dry manner. Instead, it invests The Tusk That Did The Damage with complexity and authenticity. There’s also an element of wonder as James delves into folklore and fables related to elephants — the story of how they once had wings and then developed the ivory tusks that they’re now hunted down for; stories of a magical lake that all elephants trek to just before they’re about to die and the burial ground that surrounds it, littered with a fortune in ivory.

James brings compassion to each of the characters and situations she writes about. She explains. “It’s not a conscious decision. I tend to stay close to the characters I’m writing about, trying to immerse myself in their worlds and inhabit their emotions. From that position, it’s harder to judge them…”

James studied filmmaking at Harvard and some of that training reflects in the language she uses to narrate the tale. As a reader, you can almost imagine a camera panning to a certain element, or a frame/scene being set up. James says the influence is probably a subconscious one. “I am shaped by the storytelling forms of television and movies, inevitably so, having watched them my entire life… I also think novels have influenced certain television shows, like HBO’s The Wire, which builds in complexity from episode to episode much as a novel builds in complexity from chapter to chapter,” she says.

James has also credited her time pursuing an MFA in Fiction from Columbia University as having influenced her writing. As for what else has moulded her as a writer, she says, “My family members have influenced the way I look at the world, and therefore my writing, more so than any book or author. It’s clear from the way I keep returning to family relationships in my work, and sibling relationships in particular.”