The Jungle Book

Adoption into another species or culture occurs throughout The Jungle Book, demonstrating how love and kindness can overcome differences in lineage, but sometimes causing pain and confusion in the character caught between cultural identities. Kipling may have drawn this from his own experience—he was born to English parents but raised in India and then sent to England for his education, meaning that he was cared for by many people other than his parents who came from a wide variety of cultures. Kipling expressed a love for India—though his racist and colonialist ideas must be taken into account here—but he felt alienated in England due to the cruelty of his caretakers there. Similarly, the character of Mowgli is adopted by the people of the jungle, but experiences rejection from both his human and animal homes, causing him pain and confusion. Rikki-tikki-tavi also finds himself adopted into a different society than the one in which he was raised when he is rescued by an English family, and Little Toomai is welcomed into the community of foresters despite his father’s wish that he carry on the family tradition of elephant driving.

The love and kindness of adoptive parents, particularly maternal figures, allows these interspecies adoptions to succeed and overcome natural differences. When Mowgli wanders into the wolf cave as a baby in “Mowgli’s Brothers,” it is Raksha, the mother wolf, who advocates for his adoption. She wants to keep him because she loves his bravery, telling her mate, “[H]e came naked, by night, alone and very hungry; yet he was not afraid! Look, he has pushed one of my babes to one side already” (14). When Mowgli goes to the human village in “Tiger! Tiger!”, it is a woman named Messua who becomes his caretaker because she loves his resemblance to her son Nathoo, who was taken by Shere Khan. While she seems to understand that Mowgli is not Nathoo, she still shows him kindness. Her love for Mowgli cannot protect him from being cast out of the village, but it does prevent Mowgli from taking revenge against the humans. He tells them as he leaves, “[T]hank Messua that I do not come in with my wolves and hunt you up and down your street” (125). Mowgli’s two maternal figures enable him to join the jungle and village societies, and they give him a lingering loyalty to these places even when he is cast out from them. This thematic treatment of maternal love reflects the fact that Kipling was writing for children, since it presents a comforting yet moralistic idea about family loyalty.

Likewise, in “Rikki-tikki-tavi,” the bravery of the titular mongoose causes the human family to love him, and this mutual love enables their successful interspecies alliance against the snakes. After Teddy and his parents rescue Rikki-tikki-tavi from the flood, dry him off, and feed him, the mongoose helps and protects them in return. Notably, it is Teddy’s mother whom Rikki-tikki-tavi must win over in order to find full acceptance at the end of the story. Initially, Teddy’s mother does not trust the mongoose to sleep beside her son, worrying to her husband that “he may bite the child” (179). However, after Rikki-tikki-tavi protects the family from cobras, she is no longer concerned that he sleeps on Teddy’s pillow and cries over him when he returns from fighting Nagaina.

All of the female characters in The Jungle Book are mothers, and maternal love is depicted as a powerful motivating force upon the young male protagonists. Even the antagonist, Nagaina, is driven by her wish to protect her eggs and raise her children as the dominant species in the garden. While stories such as “The White Seal” and “Toomai of the Elephants” depict father-son relationships as complex and sometimes antagonistic, maternal figures consistently provide comfort and support to the young male protagonists. Kipling portrays maternal love as one of the only bonds strong enough to overcome differences in culture and species.