The Jungle Book (novel)/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Common Knowledge: Though commonly referred to as a novel, even erroneously so here, The Jungle Book is actually a collection of short stories, as is The Second Jungle Book. In addition, not all of them are Mowgli stories, with only three out of seven in the first book and five out of eight in the second being about him, meaning Mowgli is not the protagonist of the books, but rather the Mowgli Stories that are featured among the stories in those books. As a result, this means Shere Khan is not the main antagonist either, himself only appearing in a total of three Mowgli stories.
  • Designated Villain: Nag and Nagaina want to kill the humans in the bungalow for a fairly sympathetic cause - they simply wish to raise their children in the house. Yet they're described in the narration as utterly contemptible characters with no redeeming qualities.
    • Although, granted, Nag did eat one of Darzee's children that fell out of the nest...
    • Rikki Tikki murders Nagaina's family and then gloats about it to her face, similarly to protect his adopted human family. Given the regarding of natural predators in the books' narrative, it's hard to see the former act as exceptionally evil unless it's a Double Standard.
  • Unfortunate Implications: In Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, we read about a heroic mongoose who fights against two cobras who want to kill the humans in the bungalow so that they can raise their children. Okay. But if, in the story, all animals are sapient like people, why should humans be considered objectively worth more than cobras? One could argue that it would make more sense for Nag and Nagaina to succeed in their plan, since the lives of three individuals would be sacrificed for the benefit of dozens more. Overlaps with What Measure Is a Non-Human?
    • If I recall correctly, Rikki-Tikki was simply defending the family he'd come to love. That, and he's a mongoose - killing snakes is just what they do.
    • If someone, be that a human or a cobra, decides they want to kill me and my family just so they could raise their kids in my house, I'd consider them pretty evil. Human family had a kid too, now, should he be sacrificed just because cobras outnumbered humans?
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