Rhinoceros (Reaktion Books - Animal) [Paperback]

Kelly Enright (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1861893744 | ISBN-13: 978-1861893741 | Publication Date: June 24, 2008

The rhinoceros’s horn and massive leathery frame belie its docile and solitary nature, causing the animal to be consistently perceived by humans as a monster to be feared. Kelly Enright now deftly sifts fact from fiction in Rhinoceros.

            Enright chronicles the vexed interactions between humans and rhinos, from early sightings that mistook the rhinoceros for the mythical unicorn to the eighteenth-century display of the rhinoceros in Europe as a wonder of nature and its introduction to the American public in 1830. The rhinoceros has long been a prized hunting object as well, whether for its horn as a valuable ingredient in Asian medicine or as a coveted trophy by nineteenth-century big-game hunters such as Theodore Roosevelt, and the book explains how such practices have led to the rhino’s status as an endangered species. Enright also considers portrayals of the animal in film, literature, and art, all in the service of discovering whether the reputed savagery of the rhino is a reality or a legacy of its mythic past.

A wide-ranging, highly illustrated study, Rhinoceros will be essential for scholars and animal lovers alike.

 

Editorial Reviews

Review

"The latest monograph in the winning Animal series—truly natural histories, each title a wide-ranging look at a single creature, replete with splendid illustrations—is perhaps the finest yet. Like its predecessors, this volume alternately informs, delights, moves, and astonishes. Success here owes as much to author as to subject. The former, a cultural and environmental historian, acquits herself admirably, distilling fact from fiction, employing supple and incisive prose, and trailing casual acumen in her measured wake."—Atlantic

(Atlantic )

About the Author

Kelly Enright is a cultural and environmental historian and museum anthropologist based in New Jersey.

 

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Reaktion Books (June 24, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1861893744
• ISBN-13: 978-1861893741
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #972,622 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Kelly Enright is the author of The Maximum of Wilderness: The Jungle in the American Imagination, Osa & Martin: For the Love of Adventure, and Rhinoceros. She has a doctorate in American history and a master's in museum anthropology. Her work focuses on portrayals of nature in American culture, human-animal relationships, museums, explorations, and travels.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Short on natural history, August 7, 2009

By 

Mark Vlosky (Paonia, Colorado USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Rhinoceros (Reaktion Books - Animal) (Paperback)

The book is a pleasure to handle - well sewn with sturdy glossy pages, almost like a children's book, something you never see anymore. It starts out with a fascinating history of human attitudes and perceptions of the animal through the ages, but chapter after chapter continues being devoted to mankind's feelings, fears, and mythologies about rhinoceroses. In the end, there is one paragraph each devoted to a description of the different species' natural habits in the wild. Perhaps it isn't fair to criticize the book on this point because apparently rhinoceroses are elusive. Still, I kept hoping and waiting for some natural history of the beasts' habits, talents, shortcomings, food supplies, reproductive mannerisms, social behavior, nursing behavior, conflicts with other animals, etc., all of which was treated barely in passing. I wound up disappointed in not knowing as much as I had wanted to about these splendid animals. A better title for the book would have been, How People Through the Ages Have Thought About Rhinoceroses.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Was that a Unicorn or Rhinoceros?, September 30, 2008

By 

J. Scott "TheCFO" (Ocean, NJ) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Rhinoceros (Reaktion Books - Animal) (Paperback)

Very nicely written narrative about a species that needs protection to survive in nature. Massive animals, unlike elephants, not very useful to man as beasts of burden. You will learn that they don't eat people, how they relate to unicorns and how their horn(s) are used as medicine even today. Hope to see more from this new author, it was a pleasure to read and now I know a lot more about these rare and wonderful creatures.

5.0 out of 5 stars Exhaustively researched, beautifully written., March 5, 2011

By 

Al Bondiga - See all my reviews

This review is from: Rhinoceros (Reaktion Books - Animal) (Paperback)

This is a wonderfully different book about the rhino. If you want natural history and behavior of the rhino, there are many other books on that subject. This book covers the rhino in human history, mythology and popular culture, and it covers it all. I couldn't stop reading it. Please keep writing Ms. Enright.