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The world that humans do not rule
Craig Childs' lyrical essays delve into the animal kingdom.
By Sara Rose, Associated Press
Published December 30, 2007
It's 8:30 a.m. A packed subway train crawls toward Manhattan from Brooklyn. I'm pushed on all sides, smashed against the door reading Craig Childs' new set of essays, The Animal Dialogues. Tears well as I read about a perfect blue shark dying on a desolate beach. For those of us pressed into places devoid of anything resembling the natural world, these stories invoke all that we are missing: the space, the sky, the awe at witnessing animals in their element; the wonder, the pure heart-stopping fear. While these essays may not bring tears to most readers' eyes, they do dwell in the emotional realm. Combining science, history and lyricism, Childs articulates sublime and unrepeatable moments with a cast of likely and unlikely characters. A naturalist, writer and commentator, he offers private moments in the animal world, ranging from the Sonoran desert in northern Mexico to British Columbia. Whether writing about familiar creatures such as the bear, mountain lion, coyote, dog and cat, or the unlikely - squid, rainbow trout, red-spotted toad, a long-extinct camel and the like - Childs ponders each equally. He gives as much of his curiosity to a sea lion looking in from the waves as to the lonely wasp building a nest for a swarm that never arrives. Though his musings can teeter on the edge of over the top, Childs proves to be an unflinching realist. The animal world is not a place designed with humans in mind. We may feel it spiritual, we may "find ourselves" when walking through a vast desert, but we, for once, are not at the center. In the blue shark essay he writes, "I will tell you this of the animal spirit: it will tear you in two as quickly as it will bring you to wholeness." As wild spaces become increasingly distant and threatened, Childs' narrative of his "uncommon encounters" is all the more trenchant. As we calmly intrude into this world with him, witnessing the moment "so vivid that it detaches from time," each species' individuality - and similarities - shines, humans included. The Animal Dialogues: Uncommon Encounters in the Wild By Craig Childs Little, Brown and Company, 322 pages, $24.99
[Last modified December 26, 2007, 16:38:10]
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