Water for Elephants

Water for Elephants is a historical novel by Sara Gruen. The novel centers on Jacob Jankowski and his experiences in a travelling circus called The Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth.

Plot introduction

Set during the Great Depression of the 1930s, Water for Elephants tells the story of a young man who leaves his life as a Cornell University veterinary student and jumps onto a train that happens to house the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth. After a short confrontation with Blackie, a bouncer that stops stowaways, and Camel (a limp old worker) promising him a job and an audience with Uncle Al (The Ringmaster) Jacob decides to stay aboard the train. Since his parents have died in an automobile accident, and he has not a home to call his own, he decides that joining the circus is his last resort. The story is told as a series of memories. The main character, Jacob Jankowski, is in a nursing home and reminisces about his time with the circus.

Jacob is employed as the show’s veterinarian and he faces a number of challenges in dealing with the head trainer, August, while also learning how to function in the hierarchy of the circus and falling in love.

Plot summary

The story is told as a series of memories by Jacob Jankowski, a ninety-three-year-old man who lives in a nursing home.

As the memories begin, Jacob Jankowski is twenty-three-years old and preparing for his final exams as a Cornell University veterinary student when he receives the news that his parents were killed in a car accident. Jacob’s father was a veterinarian and Jacob had planned to join his practice. When Jacob learns that his father was deeply in debt because he had been treating animals for free, he has a breakdown and leaves school just short of graduation. In the dark of night, he jumps on a train only to learn it is a circus train. When the owner of the circus, Uncle Al, learns of his training as a vet, he is hired to care for the circus animals.

The novel chronicles Jacob’s experiences with the circus as he learns the hierarchy of circus workers and performers, gains an understanding of the brutalities of circus life while struggling to maintain his own moral compass, and falls in love.

The head trainer, August, is a brutal man who abuses the animals in his care as well as the people around him. Alternately, he can be utterly charming. Jacob develops a guarded relationship with August and his wife, Marlena, with whom Jacob falls in love. August is suspicious of their relationship and beats Marlena and Jacob. Marlena subsequently leaves August, which is the precipitating event leading to the ultimate demise of the Benzini Brothers circus.

As the story climaxes, several circus workers who were redlighted off the train come back and release the animals (redlighting refers to throwing circus workers off the moving train as punishment or in order to avoid paying them^[1]). In the ensuing panic, August is killed. As a result of this incident, which occurred during a circus performance, the circus is shut down. Marlena and Jacob leave, along with several circus animals, and begin their life together.

Explanation of the novel's title

In the beginning of the novel, Jacob mocks another resident of the nursing home who claims to have worked in the circus and carried water for the elephants. We are led to believe that this is a popular, but untrue, claim.

Characters in Water for Elephants

• Jacob Jankowski – The novel’s protagonist. He is a 93-year-old nursing home resident reminiscing on the time he spent in the circus when he was in his 20s.
• Marlena – A star performer with the circus. Marlena joined the circus after she ran away from home to marry August. She enjoys a special rapport with the animals and cares for them deeply.
• August – Marlena’s husband and the head animal trainer. He is a brutal man who alternates between being abusive and everyone’s best friend. Later in the book, it is explained that he is mentally ill.
• Uncle Al – The violent, abusive owner of the circus. He is known for redlighting circus workers – throwing them off the train in the middle of the night to avoid paying them. If these roustabouts are deemed to have committed some particularly egregious offense, they were thrown off while the train was passing over a trestle, presumably with the hope that they would die or be seriously injured.
• Kinko/Walter – A dwarf with whom Jacob shares living quarters on the circus train. Initially, their relationship is rocky, but they develop a strong friendship. At the beginning of the story, he is known as Kinko. Walter is his real name and he only lets his friends call him this. He has a small dog named Queenie he is very attached to.
• Camel – One of the first people Jacob meets when he jumps the train. Camel is a drunk who is instrumental in getting Jacob in the circus. When Camel gets sick, Jacob and Walter hide him in their room and care for him.
• Rosie – An elephant that Uncle Al buys from another circus. She is believed to be useless until it is discovered that she understands commands only in Polish. She is often the target of August’s rage. August’s killer.

Major themes

The major themes explored in this novel include circus life during the depression (Gruen did extensive research on the subject^[2]), the testing of a man’s moral compass, mental illnesses, acting on emotions, and love triangles.

Allusions/references to other works

Sara Gruen has said that the backbone of her story parallels the biblical story of Jacob in the book of Genesis.^[3]

Literary significance & criticism

Please help improve this article or section by expanding it. Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion. (April 2007)

One of the most interesting aspects of the novel is that the death of August is described twice through Jacob's viewpoint, once in the Prologue and once at the end of the novel. In the first instance, the passage is written in such a way that the reader might believe that the character August is killed by Marlena, Jacob's love interest. In the second instance, August is clearly killed by Rosie the elephant. The novel leaves who actually killed August deliberately ambiguous, although the theory that it could have been Marlena is argued against by the description of the killer using a metal tent stake to split August's "head like a watermelon," something it would have been next to impossible for the slight Marlena to do. Early in the novel, Rosemary the nurse explains to Jacob that "Sometimes when you get older [...] things you think on and wish on start to seem real. And then you believe them, and before you know it they're a part of your history [...]" (177). Later, Jacob reflects how he kept the secret that Rosie killed August from Marlena. He thinks, "At first I stayed silent to protect Rosie [...].In the entire history of our marriage, it was the only secret I kept from her [...]. With a secret like that, at some point the secret itself becomes irrelevant" (327). These passages suggest that memories are inherently flawed and subjective.

However, the rest of the novel fits in the neatly with the "Rosie killed him" theory, and the author even describes this incident in the book as being based on a factual account of an elephant killing a trainer after he threw a lit cigarette in her mouth. The interpretation is ultimately left up to the reader with the Marlena theory being extremely unlikely.

Allusions/references to actual history, geography and current science

The book contains multiple references to Ringling Brothers as the best circus of the time. Also, photos of actual circuses and circus performers of the time are included throughout the book.

Awards and nominations

• 2006 Quill Awards nominee for General Fiction^[4]
  • 2007 Alex Awards selection^[5]
    • Entertainment Weekly Best Novel of 2006 nominee
    • New York Times Best Seller list for 12 weeks in 2006 (peaked at #7 on August 20, 2006)^[6]
      • BookSense #1 pick for June 2006^[7]
        • Winner of the 2007 BookBrowse award for most popular book ^[8]
          • The paperback hit #1 on the New York Times Best Seller list on July 8, 2007 ^[9]

            Release details

            • 2006, USA, Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, a division of Workman Publishing, ISBN 1565124995, Pub date 26 May 2006, Hardback
            • 2006, USA, Thorndike Press, ISBN 0786290277, Pub date 15 December 2006, Large print hardback
            • 2007, USA, Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, a division of Workman Publishing, ISBN 1565125606, Pub date 1 May 2007, Paperback
            • 2006, USA, Highbridge Audio, ISBN 1598870629, Pub date 1 June 2006, Audiobook

            References

            1. ^ Interview with Sara Gruen, Juris Jurjevics, “Reading”, San Diego Reader, November 16, 2006
            2. ^ Interview with Sara Gruen, Cathi Bond, Sara Gruen, Water for Elephants, ProseCast, July 2006
            3. ^ Reading Group Guide
            4. ^ Nominess for the 2006 Quill Awards
            5. ^ 2007 Alex Awards selections
            6. ^ The New York Times, Dwight Garner, TBR: Inside the List, January 7, 2007
            7. ^ Booksense.com picks for June 2006
            8. ^ 2007 The BookBrowse Awards (retrieved May 20, 2007)
            9. ^ New York Times Best Seller list for paperback fiction (retrieved July 12, 2007)

            
            

            Sources, external links, quotations

            • Sara Gruen's website
            • Amazon.comfr:De l'eau pour les éléphants