The Barbarians Come Out At Night.

If It Is Indeed Impossible - Or At Least Very Difficult - To Inhabit The Consciousness Of An Animal, Then In Writing About Animals There Is A Temptation To Project Upon Them Feelings And Thoughts That May Belong Only To Our Own Human Mind And Heart.

For Himself, Then. For His Idea Of The World, A World In Which Men Do Not Use Shovels To Beat Corpses Into A More Convenient Shape For Processing.

There Are Works Of Literature Whose Influence Is Strong But Indirect Because It Is Mediated Through The Whole Of The Culture Rather Than Immediately Through Imitation. Wordsworth Is The Case That Comes To Mind.

Strictly Speaking, My Interest Is Not In Legal Rights For Animals But In A Change Of Heart Towards Animals.

His Mouth Opens. From Inside Him Comes A Slow Stream, Without Breath, Without Interruption. It Flows Up Through His Body And Out Upon Me; It Passes Through The Cabin, Through The Wreck; Washing The Cliffs And Shores Of The Island, It Runs Northward And Southward To The Ends Of The Earth. Soft And Cold, Dark And Unending, It Beats Against My Eyelids, Against The Skin Of My Face.