White Elephant reflects on famine and Dalit protest in colonial Madras, India
The English-language translation of White Elephant, a novel by Tamil writer B. Jeyamohan, published by HarperCollins in 2026, tells of the Great Famine of 1876–1878 in colonial Madras, India, and the disappearance of Dalit workers at the Tudor Ice House factory. The book was translated from Tamil by Priyamvada Ramkumar; it was published in Tamil in 2013 under the title Vellai Yaanai.
As Kathmandu Post writes, the novel’s central character is Captain Aiden Byrne. He seeks a temporary halt to grain exports from Madras, Vizag and Nagore to help overcome the famine, but his request receives virtually no support. Meanwhile, the city is expanding thanks to the labour of people driven to desperation by famine.
Factory workers’ strike
In the novel, the Tudor Ice House factory stores ice frozen in New England and delivered by sea to cool colonial Madras. Dalits, driven out of bonded labour in famine-stricken rural areas, take on the exhausting work needed to preserve the ice.
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The review links the plot to a poorly documented 1878 factory workers’ strike, calling it one of the early labour protests on the subcontinent. The work contrasts the positions of the factory’s American manager, Nick Parmer, and the high-caste contractor Murahari Iyengar. Parmer eventually yields to the protesters, fearing publicity in the United States, while Iyengar promises that the protest participants will never find work again.
Colonialism and caste hierarchy
The reviewer notes that Jeyamohan combines themes of colonialism, untouchability and religious beliefs. The novel also shows hierarchies among the oppressed: the worker Karuppan tries to unite people for a protest, while Kathavarayan, who devises its strategy, simultaneously seeks a compromise.
The review mentions the imagery of poet Percy Bysshe Shelley and the broader influence of his work on Indian literature. In the reviewer’s view, Ramkumar’s translation returns to English a Tamil perspective on Western characters and the colonial era.
