John Vaillant's The Tiger

1119 Words5 Pages
Throughout this book the reader sees a region terrorized by a man-eating tiger until an organization known as Inspection Tiger goes into the region and puts the beast down. However, the real story of The Tiger isn't revealed until the tiger has been killed and all of the characters have gone their separate ways. This is the point in the story where the reader sees how all of the characters they have learned about in the past two hundred and seventy pages, have been influenced by these events. Through reactions of the characters in John Vaillant's The Tiger, we are able to see how characters have advanced through their experience while others stay unmoved like the land they live on. Throughout this story, the character Yuri Trush seems to be…show more content…
This was what Trush hope would happen to the inhabitants of Sobolanye. However, the inhabitants of this town continued on the same path that they had been on for years. The alcoholism that had all ready plagued the town, had increased in the hope that many of the memories of these past events would be washed away. Many of the people more closely affected by these events like family members or friends of the victims would die from suicide or the harsh conditions of Sobolanye. The friend of Markov, Sasha Dvornik was one person seriously traumatized by the Markov incident. "If I'd known what I would see there, I'd never have gone out to his cabin. Now, I won't let a tiger get away alive. I will exterminate that vermin everywhere"(Vaillant290). However, for most of the people in Sobolanye, there was no time to be fearful of tigers if they wanted to survive. People began returning back into the Taiga and people were still killed. These people had the same idea that Markov had before he died. If Markov moved away he would not survive, so he had to stay and try to kill the tiger or else he could no longer safely enter the Taiga. For the people Sobolanye the idea of survival had stayed the same just as it had since the effects of parastroika. Sobolanye had remained untouched even after this event because people had to…show more content…
The first scene of the story is of Markov "innocently" walking towards his cabin when he hears "a rumble in the dark that seems to come from everywhere at once"(Vailant4). As the tale continues and we learn that Markov at a certain point could have angered this beast into attacking and killing him. This idea of revenge from a wild animal is a concept that had been foreign to me. When I think of an animal killing something I think of it wanting to survive based on its natural instincts. Whether this means an animal killing its prey for food or killing another predator so that it won't become the prey. This new idea introduced by John Vaillant shows that the tiger is much more complex than a simple animal wanting to survive. The tiger is killing because it feels it has been harmed in some way by Markov and will kill him in order to right the wrong. As the story progresses further on, we see the tiger hunt for the first time; "There on the opposite bank, he spread the mattress out under a commanding spruce tree, lay down on it in plain view, and waited"(Vaillant203). This scene shows the tiger is intelligent enough to set up a trap for Andrei Pochepnya. The tiger with his second scene has now adapted to his foot injury so that he can hunt and eat easily even with his injury. Finally, in the end of the book we find out that Markov had shot the tiger at different times.
Show More
Related

  • Analysis Of Tiger Coexistence In John Vaillant's 'The Tiger'

    1367 Words  | 6 Pages

    In John Vaillant's The Tiger, the reader sees a region terrorized by a man-eating tiger until an organization known as Inspection Tiger goes into the region and puts the beast down. However, the real story of The Tiger isn't revealed until the tiger has been killed and all of the characters have gone their separate ways. This is the point in the story where the reader sees how all of the characters have changed through their experiences in the last several months. Similar to myself, Yuri Trush's

    Read More

More about John Vaillant's The Tiger

Open Document