One is beginning to see how the man’s mind works
The author suggests that "man's mind" is concerned with achieving goals. While looking for solutions, they avoid the question of how or why they ended up in their current predicament. It seems more reasonable that Elizabeth is saying "man's mind" is manipulative however she fails to elaborate on what she means by this.
a Garden ofEden
Here, the author employs Christian theology to describe this thought. The Garden of Eden is depicted as both human and devine which is a perfect example of what taxidermy tries to encapsulate. Preserved animals should be awe-inspiring while also rooted in reality.
No badgers came out to salute us. They were warm. Their sett was much deeper inthe wood than ours; far deeper than we could safely go.31
This is a very powerful ending as the author concludes that although he feverishly tried to understand the badger, his existence as a human being means that he will never be to physically be at one with them.
Badgers belong to a place and hence (terribly important, that hence) own it, likefew or no other animals do. Their hillside dynasties outlive our own most hoarilyheraldic, begartered families. Their bodies are built from the recycled earth of afew acres. They burrow deep and know whatever roams our underworld. Theyhave the connection with a body of land that one can get with any body only bypenetration. Their hold on this local life is viciously strong: they’re terribly hard tokill or displace. Their skulls are thick. Spades bounce off their sagittal crest. Oncethey’ve locked their teeth in the throat of an invading terrier, you have to break thejaw to prise them off.Badgers, for me, are the embodiment of the genius loci
Here, the author physically describes the connection between the badger and the land then expands on it by connecting it to a spiritual connection.
The first step in any campaign is to know where you are. You need a map. And youneed to know what’s possible and what’s not. That second step was easy.
The author describes his attempts to understand the badger in terms of warfare.
Then walk quietly to a road. The first car willseem like a regiment of tanks. You’ll feel violated and feel that the land is violated.You’ll note in yourself, perhaps with surprise, that since both you and the land areviolated, there must be a previously unrecognised solidarity between you and theland.
Coming from California, I felt the EXACT same way while I was walking around my friend's neighborhood in New Jersey. There is an overemphasis on cars and freeway access points instead of local communities and the land on which its based on.
The dog shit draws out his inchoate distaste forthe domestic.
This is a fascinating paragraph. If I am understanding this correctly, the author is saying that man is disgusted by domestic animal excrement while he doesn't have the same response when examining those of a fox.
badger would have welcomed it as a pasha on his couchwelcomes a grape dropped by a slave,
The author is really good at drawing human comparisons with animals. Here, he portrays the badger as living on top of the world surrounded by the world's finest luxuries.
Just listen to how careful I’m being to speakthe language of the Academy. Isn’t it absurd?
I think that the author is employing humor at his own expense here. A lot of the time I think the same thing when I read convoluted descriptions of things that are really simple to convey.
There’s every reason to suppose that they were in this valley long before the BronzeAge child killers.
I personally find this very persuasive when it comes to relating to animals instead of humans. Even if humans were futile how could animals have more decency than human beings?
‘You want to be a fox? It just takes a bit of practice in a darkened room with acandle and a chicken
It seems that the author is trying to bridge the gap between humans and animals by bringing up that our actions (consuming chickens) is universal between humand and foxes. I also find it interesting that instead of brining up that it may take a considerable amount of time for a human to resort to eating a live chicken, he framed it as a mental excercise.
A pipe of herb tobacco would sit comfortably in those massive, undislocatable jaws.
I really like this quote because when I read the descriptions of eating worms I felt disgusted. However, the less-natural and more toxic attributes of tobacco probably makes the mole feel the same way.
About 85 per cent of an average badger’s diet is earthworms.
The author officially announces that he is not describing himself as the one who is eating the badger. I find it interesting that he introduces this by stating a fact about the animal instead of describing his efforts to be the animal.
it senses the heat as something sinister.
This is interesting because many animals are attracted to warmth. Heat for many animals ensures survival. However in this case it appears as heat may be synonymous to being placed into an oven.
“One is beginning to see how the man’s mind works.”
The author suggests that "man's mind" is concerned with achieving goals. While looking for solutions, they avoid the question of how or why they ended up in their current predicament. It seems more reasonable that Elizabeth is saying "man's mind" is manipulative however she fails to elaborate on what she means by this.
“Between 1942 and 1945 several million people were put to death in the concentra-tion camps of the Third Reich: at Treblinka alone more than a million and a half,perhaps as many as three million. These are numbers that numb the mind. We haveonly one death of our own; we can comprehend the deaths of others only one at atime. In the abstract we may be able to count to a million, but we cannot count to amillion deaths.”
While reading Elizabeth's perspective on animal cruelty, I believe her reaction would differ if she was Jewish or had personal experiences with the atrocities committed by the Nazis. Despite Elizabeth's evident knowledge of the Shoah, it appears that she lacks the emotional resonance that one might expect when discussing a historical tragedy.
a grown dog’s sexual needs, as nothing but trouble.
I am curious to know if Elizabeth would support neuturing animals. I never owned a dog so I am curious as to know why this would pose such a significant problem for a potential owner.
“A long flight,” he remarks. “You must be exhausted.”
It's interesting that these are some of the first words exchanged after two whole years of not seeing each other! I think the author included this in order to give a concrete example of how they were never "demonstrative family". This can be very valuable because it can depict a unique family dynamic that readers may be unfamiliar with
Biggest was always best—record trophiesundermined satisfaction with smaller specimens, so females were less likely to beselected than males.
I think that this is a very revealing quote. This is because the author switches from the notion of retrieving a "'typical' specimen" to attemping to grab the most glamarous one. Typical would not discriminate between sex.
There was much humbuggery—the Feejee mermaidwas in fact half baby monkey and half fish, sewn together and covered in papiermâché (a very well-executed fake)—and Barnum’s sensationalism, his unfaithfulrelationship to the “real,” had long been anathematized by starchy educators.
Here, the author portrays the practitioners of logic in a negative fashion. He does this by referring to educators as "starchy". Educators may have a problem with the exhibit as it does not accurately depict reality.
On their dash to safety along corridors and down stairwells, they hadto overleap the anacondas, pythons, and other gigantic snakes whose large sharedcage had capsized, sending its tenants to wander wherever they fancied.
The author does a good job at employing humor in the previous sentence. Also, the author elaborates on the scene unfolding. He does this by detailing the objects and animals as equally as crazy as both the human exhibits as the event at-large