Suddenly I found myself reading about man-eating tigers. In my wanderings on the web I will occasionally encounter a conversation where multiple people chime in on the excellence of a certain book, often one I have never heard of. I will then immediately hit Amazon and read up on it. If it looks promising I usually add it to my wish list. When in need or reading, I'll revisit that list for ideas. (I should publish the list. It is remarkably eclectic.) Sometimes these finds don't pan out; I will forever be stunned at how many bad or pointless books get rave reviews. That was not the case at all with The Tiger, by John Valliant.
I did not realize there were any such things as Siberian Tigers left in the world. In fact, if you had told me they had not existed since the days of cavemen, I would not have doubted you. But there are. While not flourishing, they are not uncommon in the remote areas of Siberia, near the Manchurian border, and a reality of daily life in the hand-to-mouth villages that exist in their midst.
Valliant documents the story of one which had taken to not just opportunistically eating the local denizens, but seemingly stalking specific individuals out of malice and vengeance. A much-liked local, who often tested the poaching laws seems to have had an encounter with a tiger which appears to have angered the tiger to the point of stalking and killing him while passing up easier human prey. Of course, opinions vary as to whether the man brought on his own destruction or not, but in any case it is up to the local enforcers of environmental policy to deal with the situation. There is another kill, again with questions about cause and effect. In a dramatic finale, the environmental cops track and kill the tiger, but not without the tiger getting in a good lick or two.
It is within that skeleton of an outline that the magic happens. Valliant scores with this narrative on multiple levels. He nails the local flavor, highlighting the hard life of the people in this remote wilderness, who live and die with the land and for whom hunting is a matter of life and death. He nails the cultural conflicts of the desire of conservationist and the wildlife protection laws versus the poverty stricken who can make year's worth of income by poaching one tiger and selling it to the Chinese. He nails the politics and how perestroika effectively killed the mining in this region and the dismissiveness and contempt of the people towards a corrupt government half a world away. He nails the history with compelling profile of the early explorers and the sorts of circumstances that would cause people to settle in such a remote and terrible (though beautiful) land. He nails the psychology of man versus tiger by not just describing the terror of living amidst and man-eater, but also getting deep inside the tiger's head and it motivations. (It's worth noting that, although man, should he choose to, could easily wipe out tigers now, over the epochs back into prehistory, tigers have an insurmountable lead in the kill count.) He nails the tension of the hunt, the palpable fear of knowing the man-eater amy be lurking behind any bush or in any shadow and the incredible speed of their attack; less than five seconds can determine life or death. Lastly, he nails the aftermath, often tragic, of the people touched by the man-eater.
Should you read The Tiger? Yes, absolutely. It is riveting start to finish.
But that put me on a man-eating tiger kick, and it seems the classic of the genre is Man-eaters of Kumaon by Jim Corbett. Corbett was a legendary hunter operating in India betweens the wars. (Does it make sense to say "between the wars" anymore? For you young'ns, that's between WWI and WWII, or the 1920s and 1930s.) At this time in the remote areas of India, tigers were responsible for hundreds, if not thousands of human kills every year. Corbett was often called in to deal with beasts that had killed dozens of people.
Corbett himself, was one of those old school, understated, fearless subjects of the Crown that now exist only in stories found in used book stores. As a point of honor, he considered himself a sportsman and apparently an amatuer, taking pains to differentiate himself from a "reward hunter," saying he would prefer to be shot rather than hunt for reward. He wonders whether sitting up in wait for a tiger to return to a partially eaten kill is "cricket", i.e. unfair to the tiger. He regularly marches in to the jungle alone, effectively making himself bait. He sleeps in trees to the point of mastering the art -- in fact, killed a man-eater who attacked him after he had been sitting in a tree for over 15 hours waiting (I have trouble sitting still if a meeting runs longer than an hour). He lead a party to pursue a wounded bear, and after running out of ammo, killed it with rocks and an axe.
As riveting and compelling as Valliant's story was of the man-eating tiger in Siberia, such an escapade would have merited only a shrug and a footnote from Corbett. Dude was on another level. So much so that often his tales beggar belief. He writes of how he has developed instinct and intuition and occasionally "just knows" a tiger is lurking behind a certain rock. It sounds like witchcraft but the sincerity and authenticity of his voice makes you believe it. One assumes this intuition is nothing but reaction to stimulus such as scent or sound that is perceived subconsciously, thus it is perfectly possible. I mean, if anyone had hunting skills that transcend to objective and observable it would be Corbett. His understanding and application of tracking and hunting methods is masterly.
Should you read Man-eaters of Kuamong? If you ever want an example of totally unaffected prose, Corbett is your man. He puts on no airs and, apart from the understatement one expects from old, British adventurers, everything is face value. Stories are related in a straightforward way, without ornamentation or high-minded digressions. Corbett is truly authentic. That said, contemporary audiences will probably be looking for more bombast or for something to relate to great social themes or virtue signalling. You will find none of that. To me, that's a blessing.
Later in life, Corbett, who even in the course of his hunting years was often accused of preferring to photograph wildlife rather than shoot it, became a strong advocate of the preservation and protection of tigers. Valliant, for his part, after examining the terror a man-eater can inflict, took time to write an epilogue that is a strident plea for tiger conservation and the man tasked with killing the man-eater in his book expressed similar sentiments. I would guess that is probably the case more often than not: Surviving a deadly encounter with such a predator inclines one to want to preserve it. The psychology and science of that reaction are worth an essay in itself. Homo Sapiens has been relating stores of man-eaters for all of our existence. It seems even though we could end that, we don't really want to.
