Hanns-Josef Ortheil describes in his autobiographical grand essay why language has fascinated him since childhood and how he became one of the most significant German authors of the middle generation. At the age of eight, his first story was published, and since then, he has been condemned to write in the most pleasurable way imaginable, much like Jean-Paul Sartre describes in his famous book "The Words." "The Element of the Elephant" is the exceedingly illuminating self-portrait of a great writer.