Welcome to Litsy!

An unusual collection that presents 17 more or less famous animals. What makes this collection unusual is the choice of narrative style - different for each 'essay', which undoubtedly brightens up the entire collection, which otherwise could quickly slip into the zone of boredom … but the collection is interesting, playful and well researched. My favourite story is Vogel Staar - story about Mozart‘s starling. Good companion for #audiowalks

It‘s time to do some #audioknitting

The 16 essays in this collection each feature some animal of historical significance, but they sprawl brilliantly across topics as diverse as science, myth, pop culture, poetry, and humor. Slyly subversive, Passarello skewers our modern conceptions of who we are in relation to the natural world by revealing the absurd, careless violence of our historical relations with animals.

Opening with the exhuming of a 39,000 year old mummified wooly mammoth and spanning centuries with such subjects as the long life and loves of Darwin‘s tortoise Harriet, electricity and the elephant Jumbo, a dirty joke as told by the gorilla Koko, & more, this powerhouse collection of essays is a poetic and piercing journey through history and the human imagination in relationship to animals, an inspiring, grisly, dark, funny, and revelatory read.

Each essay in this collection focuses on a famous animal, spanning from prehistoric times to present day. An essay collection on animals sounds like a light read, but this was easily my most challenging of the year. One reason is that the essays aren't 'about' the animals as much as the animals within the historical contexts they appear, and the entire spectrum of human responses that occur, from reverence to exploitation to downright cruelty 👇

Had I never listened to Elena Passarello's podcast, I might have assumed this was just coincidental and not a Duran Duran reference dropped without comment into an otherwise entirely straight-faced essay. But knowing a little about the author's personality, this was 100% intentional. I've only just started the second essay and I'm hooked. I also recommend the podcast which is about the literary essay - linked in the comments.

#AyupAugust #animal
I heard about this one on a favorite podcast (A Good Read), recommended by actress Nicola Walker....
I don‘t read a ton of Non Fiction but this one sounds unusual, beautiful and has an awesome (Prince lyric) title!
Here is the link to the podcast episode...
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/books-and-authors/id331296649?i=1000433525...

@Alicia #LitsyJusticeLeague!!! How sneaky you are and what an awesome haul of books you have sent me!! You know these are all ones I wanted and I have been a hair‘s breadth away from buying Elena‘s book- What a joy to have a signed to ME copy!!! Also, The illustrated Bui memoir has been so lauded at Bookriot and the food memoir (Paris and food, yes please) and Women‘s Hour is about TN and the vote took place at The Hermitage Hotel!!!⤵️

@thequeerspiderwoman this is #Sietje‘s typical morning pose. It‘s the cutest when she starts dreaming and twitching her feet. And you can see #Froedrick ‘s ears, he likes to always be covered up.

I hope you have a terrific weekend!

I‘m getting an early start to my #LitsyPartyOfOne!

A collection of essays on animals, all of which I loved.

Where cows use lips mostly as protective cases for teeth, horse lips are much more ambitious. Six long muscles pull in multiple directions. The upper lip is prehensile & almost frighteningly sensitive, designed not only to grab food, but to sort it. As their mouths became nimbler, horses developed culture around their lips, which became velvety social instruments for nipping & nuzzling & holding emotional tension.

It could be that all we really see when we look at a 'Rhinocerus' print (as we now have for half a millennium) is an interior—one that's made of what WE wonder, what WE want, and what confuses us. Not the facts of a rhinoceros, but a two-horned body twisted by the facts of human anxiety and awe.

I get so wrapped up in reading that I set a timer for steeping my tea. Timer rings, put down book. When I lifted out the tea strainer, it had no tea in it. #onetrackmind

Your wildest anxieties, your most Godforsaken imaginings—they could all be pulled out of the sky and made manifest in a woodcut of a nightmare beast, a fresh pox, or a folktale from the other side of a world that no longer had sides, as Magellan had just confirmed the Earth to be a deepening sphere.

To the Wolf, however, Francis did not speak of God's generosity. Instead, he said, "Brother, I know your hunger."
To this, the Wolf answered, "Lo!"

He puts a hand to that soft wall and there she is, running for eight thousand years. And he becomes the mammoth so he can envision the mammoth, running toward his hand so fast her feet are rounded blurs at the ends of her triangle legs. His palm on the rock and her red fur, the thrum of his heart and the roll of her feet.
[image from Internet: Chauvet cave]

Here is one from my tbr that is just perfect for #whendovescry! It is a collection of biographies of animals that have been immortalized by humans, including Cecil the Lion, a mummified wooly mammoth, and a space station spider. Sigh, so many books, so little time! #lyricalapril

New books in since the weekend. I now have all the Baileys Prize for Women longlist except one that should arrive tomorrow and one I had gotten from the library; I've started getting some of the Man Booker International longlist (more on the way), and the rest I thought sounded good. I have no excuse to offer as to why I have so many books. I don't think I need one. 📚📚📚 #nosuchthingastoomanybooks