The Elephant Keeper

(Paperback)

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

I asked the sailor what an Elephant looked like; he replied that it was like nothing on earth.
In the middle of the 18th century, a ship docks at Bristol with an extraordinary cargo: two young elephants. Bought by a wealthy landowner, they are taken to his estate in the English countryside. A stable boy, Tom Page, is given the task of caring for them.

The Elephant Keeper is Toms account of his life with the elephants. As the years pass, and as they journey across England, his relationship with the female elephant deepens in a startling manner. Along the way they meet incredulity, distrust and tragedy, and it is only their understanding of each other that keeps them together.

Christopher Nicholsons charming and captivating novel explores notions of sexuality and violence, freedom and captivity, and the nature of story-telling but most of all it is the study of a profound and remarkable love between an elephant and a human being.

Reviews

Captivatingly originala wonderful feat of story-telling, remarkable for its ability to wrench your heart without resorting to sentimentality. Daily Mail

The Elephant Keeper evokes 18th-century village and estate life beautifully, and is stuffed with fascinating data from medical and veterinary history. Independent

Charming and courageous Sunday Express

This charming first novel, told in Tom's tender, somewhat melancholic voice, is an account of this unusual relationship. Independent on Sunday

Like the elephant at its centre, Nicholsons book is gentle, profound and sweet-natured. Observer

A pleasingly ambling tale FT

Author Bio

Christopher Nicholson was brought up in north Surrey, some thirty miles south of London. At Cambridge University he studied under the late modernist poet Jeremy Prynne. Soon after Cambridge he spent three years as a community development worker in rural Cornwall. In 1981 he moved to London and got a job as a scriptwriter with the BBC World Service; he stayed with the BBC until the mid 1990s, off and on, making and presenting feature programmes and documentaries. Some won awards. In this period he twice resigned from the BBC staff to find more time for writing. During the late 1990s and early 2000s he did a good deal of freelance work for the BBC's Chinese Service. He has written full-time since then, and now lives on the northern edges of Dorset.