In Annie Dillard’s essay “Living Like Weasels,” she describes her encounter with a wild weasel, and how her recent research of the tenacious animal has led her to consider how humans live and what makes us so different from the beasts. Similarly, in a more domestic encounter, I too have been led to consider the nature of human life and why we should behave so differently from our animal counterparts. We can learn many lessons from even the most common creatures, and I feel that there is one perspective in particular we must reconsider adopting; a protective nature of empathy and love that will make us contemplate the difference between survival and living.
In part three of her essay, Dillard describes her intimate encounter with a weasel, the indescribable strength of it, and how connecting to the animal’s mind and soul through a single look “felled the forest, moved the fields, and drained the pond; the world dismantled and tumbled into that black hole of eyes” (121). Dillard connected to the
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freeness of the creature, to the unplanning, unworried, mindless heart; from this her curiosity sprang, a wonder of how we humans could become more mindless and live free of worry, choice, or morality, and grow to act only out of necessity, as animals do. However, I am unsure that all animals only act out of necessity; not all animals must be so cold and mindless as to lack the ability to choose love or empathy. Even our own pets care for us; they greet us at the door when we come home, play with us to chase away our sadness, curl up at our feet at night to show us we are not alone. They choose, every day, to love us as their family; to them, living is not just mindless survival and a source of shelter, but a source of bright joy and high purpose. What higher purpose could there be, but to love and live for others? My own darling Henry, a labrador retriever of only two years, can sometimes be a pain, I admit; however, his heart is strong and full of love for his family, and he shows it to us every day. When we walk in the door after a long day at school and he’s wagging his tail so hard, I’m afraid he’ll hurt himself on the walls, his choice to love us is clear. When I cry and lock myself in my room from stress or sadness and he lays at my door and cries, his longing to protect me is obvious. Though he is constantly exploring where he shouldn’t and continuously being scolded for it, even as you beg him to go away, Henry refuses to stop giving kisses, bringing toys, or flopping all 90 pounds of his weight down on your feet. He is as tenacious as Dillard’s weasel, yet he does not live solely in necessity; but rather, makes the constant choice to love and protect his family. This sentiment is strongly supported by a very recent example; over the weekend, I fell ill.
Nothing too serious, yet I spent most of my time sleeping and confined myself to my room as not to infect anyone else. Henry laid outside my door for hours, then snuck into my room when I left to grab more tissues. When I returned, he was sitting on my bed, waiting for me; after I climbed in, he leaned his body against my legs and lay his head across my feet. He gently comforted me, and he kept me company silently while I read, worked on homework, and, of course, slept. Although everyone else in the house avoided me like I was the Grim Reaper, Henry loyally remained at my side. He even made sure I was caring for myself, knocking my water cup onto the floor when it was empty and kissing my face when I dozed off with my glasses on. He chose to care for me over himself; not in the mindless, survival driven way of Dillard’s weasel, but in the comforting, caring way of a
friend. When Dillard insists that she wants to remember how to live, that she went to the pond to “learn something of mindlessness, something of purity of living in the physical senses and the dignity of living without bias or motive,” I respond that such sentiment is right and good; but still, foolish and unguided (121). Instead, we should learn to live as friends, family, and caregivers. What way of life could be more pure or dignified than a life that we live for others out of the love in our hearts? Yet, we must make the choice to live so; no one can make it for us, and in today’s society, such an open and giving way is not well supported. How could we surrender that choice, that choice which makes us human, the choice to stand up for our fellow human and love? In section five, Dillard insists that we live by choice. We must choose our passions and follow them where they lead. “We can live any way we want,” truly; however, each man, woman, child, and person must choose how they live, and why (122). Each human must pick a passion, a love, so that they may have the strength to survive. For without passion, life is only dreary survival, mindless, careless, memoryless. I feel that each passion should be a love toward another; let love be our motive, protectiveness be our bias, caring be our strength and our weakness. We hold the power to choose, and are more than simple tenacity. We must remember how to live, yes, but remember how to live in love for one another. Although Dillard explains living in the purity of passion, of being as tenacious as a wild weasel as we race after our goals, I believe that there is more to living than this simple survival; as humans, we must love and care for each other, in empathy and wholeheartedness as is only found so completely in others for short glimpses, when we are least expecting it. We must live with devotion and loyalty, free of foolish restraint, as a student loves her teacher, a mother loves her child, or a dog loves his master.
depressed and could barely function. Henry's state of mind is so bad that one night when
"Everyone is influenced by their childhood. The things I write about and illustrate come from a vast range of inputs, from the earliest impressions of a little child, others from things I saw yesterday and still others from completely out of the blue, though no doubt they owe their arrival to some stimulus, albeit unconscious. I have a great love of wildlife, inherited from my parents, which show through in my subject matter, though always with a view to the humorous—not as a reflective device but as a reflection of my own fairly happy nature.
Henry was an extremely lonely nine-year-old boy whose greatest wish was to get a dog. His parents were busy with their work most of the time and it seemed that Henry did not have any friends, perhaps because they moved so often. A dog would have provided Henry with unconditional love - something in short supply around his house - and would have been the perfect companion. The problem was, his parents did not want dog, which would have been another obligation and something else to take care of. As emotionally detached as his parents were, something else to take care of was just not desirable.
Judith Beveridge uses many language techniques to attract her reader’s attention to the negative effects of keeping animals captive. The Giraffe is depicted as a crippled, lonely, and unhealthy animal as a result of being held in captivity. The use of a personification in the line “Her gaze has the loneliness of smoke” emphasises how lonely the Giraffe is as a result of being isolated for so long, eventually leading to having empty, blank, expressionless eyes.
The first and most obvious change in behavior is shown by comparing Henry?s actions when they stopped at the place with the willows during the road trip and the description of Henry when he first returned home from the war. While resting at the willows, Lyman said, ?Henry was asleep with his arms thrown wide? (366). Henry was completely relaxed. When a dog or cat lies on his back with his belly exposed, he is making himself vulnerable, so therefore this is a sign of trust. Henry is showing a similar trust by lying in that position. This changes drastically when Henry comes home from the war. Lyman states, ?Henry was very different, and I?ll say this: the change was no good. You could hardly expect him to change for the better, I know. But he was quiet, so quiet, and never comfortable sitting still anywhere but always up and moving around? (367). The war has turned him into a very cautious man...
It appears that the war in Vietnam has still gotten into Henry. The war may be over in reality but in his mind it is still going on. This can explain all the agitations and discomfort he has such as not being able to sit still. Based on research, what Henry was experiencing was shellshock from the battlefield from the many soldiers being killed to t...
In the article “A change of heart about animals” author Jeremy Rifkin uses rhetorical appeals such as ethos, logos, and pathos to persuade humanity in a desperate attempt to at the very least have empathy for “our fellow creatures” on account of the numerous research done in pursuit of animal rights. Rifkin explains here that animals are more like us than we imagined, that we are not the only creatures that experience complex emotions, and that we are not the only ones who deserve empathy.
Giving animals credit for human emotions allows us to empathize with them. The woman in “The Buffalo” longs to empathize with an animal, one who can “teach her to keep her own hatred. . . .which belonged to her by right but which she could not attain in grief” (Lispector, 1972: p. 152). As a recently devastated woman, all she wants to do is loathe the man who broke her heart, but she is unable to do so because of her undeniable love for him. She believes that an animal can best demonstrate the feeling she cannot find on her own. When she comes across the buffalo, she is finally able to understand the feeling of hatred within her, because the buffalo’s passivity reflects her subconsciously projected emotions. In doing this, she is able to empathize with the animal and learn more about herself.
...vivalist instinct that involves self-preservation. Hobbes, however, is unable to explain altruism, thus we developed the Varied Levels of Survivalism as a layer above his theory. This modification allows for varying motives based on circumstances, all based on survival. Hume takes note of this altruistic tendency but he gives a scenario that is either inapplicable or he does not filter survivalism from humanity. Utilizing Hobbes’ survivalism, Hume’s generosity when capable, and the Varied Levels of Survivalism, we arrive at a viable theory of human nature and explanation of human behavior.
In “Living Like Weasels,” by Annie Dillard explains her experience with a weasel and why we should live like one. She begins, describing the weasel nature saying that they sleep in an underground den, with his tail draped over his nose. The weasel stalks rabbits, mice, muskrats, and birds. Also, weasels live off instinct, biting his prey at the neck splitting the jugular vein or crunching on the brain at the base of the prey skull not letting go. While Dillard was at a place called Hollins Ponds where she goes to escape reality she comes across this weasel that tapped into her thoughts as she did the same. Then she describes this moment as two lovers looking at each other, or deadly enemies that met unexpectedly on an path. Finally, from her experience with a weasel she believes that we all should live like one.
The image of the “detailed and lifelike painting of a smiling clown’s head, made out of vegetables” (Dillard) evokes an unforgettable haunting that would journey with Dillard and me wherever we go. Although Annie Dillard’s disarranged ramblings are mentioned here and there, she is always able to relate back to them with a connection. The jumbled ramblings illustrate that the human thought process is not always consistently straightforward and directly logical to one’s mind. While trying to grasp the workings of the total eclipse, she compared how it did not make sense to food; “given a flashlight, a grapefruit, two oranges, and fifteen years, we still could not figure out” (Dillard). Near the end, Dillard relates the smiling vegetable clown
People today always humanize non human beings. Whenever you name your pet, you make it more human. However, cattle on farms are numbered. We choose what we want to humanize, and put more value on animals we have humanized. Your pet you would no longer see as a resource with a name like Ringo or Grizzly, but 157 is who is going to be your steak next week. A harsh, but true reality. We do it to “the prevention of human pain than we do for preventing such things as freedom infringements, ad have been more through in our anthropomorphic transference,” (Guthrie 224). Guthrie believes that through anthropomorphic
“[This book is] perhaps the most successful and beloved animal story ever written” (reviewer of The Junior Book of Authors, 2002). She created a book so powerful that it moves the human heart, with her strong and successful attempt “to induce kindness, sympathy, and an understanding treatment of horses” (“Anna Sewell,” 2002). So she effectively saved horses from abuse while sending people on a fantastic journey.
Armbruster, K. (2002). “Good Dog”: The stories we tell about our canine companions and what they mean for humans and other animals, 38 (4), 351, 26. Retrieved from http://www.siue.edu/PLL/
watching them, the animals are unhappy, and they suffer. Therefore, this essay will argue why