Though people generally do not think of them in such terms, crows are remarkably graceful: from the tip of a crow’s beak to the end of its tail is a single curve, which changes rhythmically as the crow turns its head or bends toward the ground. Foraging on their long, powerful legs, crows appear to glide over the earth; they take flight almost without effort, flapping their wings easily, ascending into the air like spirits.
Nevertheless, the whiskers around their beaks and an apparent smile make crows, in a scruffy sort of way, endearingly "human". In a vast range of cultures from the Chinese to the Hopi Indians, crows are bearers of prophecy. Because of their courtship dances and monogamous unions, the Greeks invoked crows at weddings as symbols of conjugal love. Crows are among the most ubiquitous of birds, yet, without being in the least exotic, they remain mysterious.
This book is a survey of crows, ravens, magpies and their relatives in myth, literature and life. It ranges from the raven sent out by Noah to the corvid deities of the Eskimo, to Taoist legends, Victorian novels and contemporary films. It will be of interest to all people who have ever been intrigued, puzzled, annoyed or charmed by these wonderfully intelligent birds.
"Boria Sax''s Crow takes a broadly chronological approach, with an intriguing digression on scarecrows. There are strong themes in the way different cultures have thought about crows (and ravens)."—Independent
(The Independent 20040501)
"This authoritative and well-researched volume is an ideal source of reference for anyone who has ever been intrigued, annoyed or charmed by these wonderful birds"—Cage and Aviary Birds
(Matt Smith Cage and Aviary Birds 20040401)
"A fascinating and delightful book... an excellent read for anyone interested in this group of birds."—British Trust for Ornithology
(British Trust for Ornithology )
"the sort of mongraph I treasure and seek out, a work that draws together around a totem animal centuries of relevant lore, a richness of iconographic treatments and the best natural history and natural science available to a lay researcher and engaged author"--David Scofield Wilson, H-Net Reviews
Our stories begin long before we are born, and contain more than we can ever know. I have told the story of my early years in the book Stealing Fire: A Boyhood in the Shadow of Atomic Espionage, which will be published by Ad Infinitum Books in 2009. But when I look back, I find myself asking, "Was that really me?" If the reader hears my voice in these printed words, it is for her to say.
I first became interested in the literature of animals around the end of the 1980's, not terribly long after I had obtained my Ph.D. in German and intellectual history. I was feeling frustrated in my search for an academic job and even study of literature. By accident, I came across an encyclopedia of animals that had been written in the early nineteenth century. There, without any self-consciousness, was a new world of romance and adventure, filled with turkeys that spoke Arabic, beavers that build like architects, and dogs that solve murders. Within a few months, I had junked my previous research and devoted my studies to these texts.
Today, I shudder how nervy the switch was for a destitute young scholar, who, despite one book and several articles, had not managed to obtain any steady job except mopping floors. But soon I had managed to publish two books on animals in literature, The Frog King (1990) and The Parliament of Animals (1992). Around 1995, I founded Nature in Legend and Story (NILAS, Inc.), an organization that combines storytelling and scholarship. It was initially, a sort of rag-tag band of intellectual adventurers who loved literature but could not find a niche in the scholarly world. We put together a few conferences, which generated a lot of excitement among the few who attended, but little notice in academia or in what they sometimes call "the real world."
From fables and anecdotes, I moved to mythology, and published The Serpent and the Swan (1997), a study of animal bride tales from around the world. This was followed by many further publications including an examination of the darker side of animal studies, Animals in the Third Reich (2000), and a sort of compendium, The Mythical Zoo (2002), and a cultural history of corvids entitled Crow (2003). At the moment I am finishing up a history of the famous ravens in the Tower of London.
When I embarked on the study of animals in myth and literature, even graduate students did not have to mention a few dozen books just to show that they had read them. In barely more than a couple decades, the literature on human-animal relations has grown enormously in both quantity and sophistication. NILAS, I am proud to say, has become a well established organization, which has sponsored two highly successful conferences together with ISAZ.
But as the study of animals, what I like to call "totemic literature," becomes more of a standard feature of academic programs, I fear that something may be lost. It is now just a little too easy to discourse about the "social construction" and the "transgression" of "boundaries" between animals and human beings. Even as I admire the subtlety of such analysis, I sometimes find myself thinking, "So what?" Having been there close to the beginning, part of my role is now to preserve some the sensuous immediacy, with that filled the study of animals in literature when it was still a novelty. That sort of "poetry" is not simply a luxury in our intellectual pursuits. With such developments as cloning, genetic engineering, and the massive destruction of natural habitats, we face crises so unprecedented that traditional philosophies, from utilitarianism to deep ecology, can offer us precious little guidance. The possibilities are so overwhelming, that we hardly even know what questions to ask. But neither, I am sure, did the fugitive who once encountered a mermaid in the middle of the woods.
For the last seven years or so, I have made my living mostly in online learning, where I deal directly with the technologies that are transforming our lives. It is also the vortex of countless stories that are exchanged over the internet, in the form of rumors, gossip, urban legends, tall tales, and perhaps even the beginning of a new mythology. I have sat in solitude before the computer screen, as the alchemists of old did before their tubes and vessels. I have found solace in novel forms of community, at the disembodied voices of friends appeared with messages, which has now almost ceased to appear strange.
This review is from: Crow (Reaktion Books - Animal) (Paperback)
In CROW, Boria Sax compiles a veritable treasure-trove of material about crows and other close relatives such as ravens, jackdaws, and other corvids. Sax organizes the information into mostly chronological chapters, beginning with "Mesopotamia," which deals with corvids in Biblical and ancient lore, and eventually progressing to chapters about American Indian traditions and eventually Romantic and modern treatments of the birds. Although Sax's writing style is ordered and logical, it sometimes flows a little unevenly - but I think this is largely because there is no easy way to segue between some of the anecdotes and historical accounts in CROW. Overall, however, these small quibbles don't detract from the larger picture that Sax paints of these mysterious, mischievous, and sometimes misunderstood birds. There's a good proportion of folklore, legend, and fact in CROW, and it's presented alongside appealing images of paintings and other historical works of art.
In the end, CROW is a great book to have if you're interested in learning more about corvids and their ever-changing relationship with humans throughout history.
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This review is from: Crow (Reaktion Books - Animal) (Paperback)
I picked up this book in a Half Moon Bay bookstore hoping to expand my collection of symbology and history books. The author presents her subject well and it does give a decent overview on how the crow has been represented in history. The problem lay with the 'facts' the author used to link many of the myths or point out uses of the crow in ancient stories/artwork. From the areas that she talked about and I was familiar with, the author routinely exaggerated and/or relied on suppositions. I read the book all the way through, but I didn't feel like I could trust any of the information in the book.
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