Synopsis
History attests that in 1551, an elephant made the journey from Lisbon to Vienna. Solomon the elephant and his mahout had already made a long sea voyage from Goa and spent a couple of years standing about in a pen in Lisbon, before setting off for Valladolid as a present from the king to the archduke, who travelled with him to Italy by ship and across the Alps to Vienna. In the play, loosely based on Nobel laureate Jose Saramago’s ‘The Elephant’s Journey’, Solomon and his mahout Subhro proceed through various landscapes at an unhurried pace, attended by various functionaries and military men, and meeting along the way with villagers and townsfolk who variously interpret the sudden enigma of an elephant entering their lives.
Director’s Note
The play’s narrative makes no attempt to get inside Solomon’s head but the play does give us hints of what might be going on in Solomon’s heart. Throughout his long trip, the elephant does try to please Subhro and their emotional bond is one of the play’s many delights. Just beneath the play’s straightforward surface lie more complicated issues of class conflict and religious tensions. This lighthearted play in Hindi and Gibberish is a tale rich in irony and empathy, regularly interrupted by witty reflections on human nature and arch commentary on the powerful who insult human dignity. The main focus here is how ridiculous and short-sighted human behavior can become when it is invisibly channeled by social and cultural forces. Human folly is the true raging beast in the play. And what happens when the elephant reaches Vienna?
Subhro exclaims “There’ll be a lot of applause, a lot of people crowding the streets, and then they’ll forget all about him. That’s the law of life: Triumph and oblivion.”
