The Mythical Zoo

by Boria Sax

First thought to be divine, animals have played an active role in human culture since prehistoric times. Even today, animals wield symbolic powers as varied as the cultures that embrace them. From ants and elephants to tigers and wrens, the 75 conversational entries in this volume weave together a cross-cultural tapestry encompassing mythology, history, art, science, philosophy and literature while discussing the special significance of animals in human cultures.

Genres: Nonfiction, Animals, History, Mythology, Reference, Adult, Folklore

336 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

A person is not a list of accomplishments, and so I prefer not to introduce myself in that way. It is more accurate to say each of us is a collection of stories. Like others, I have more stories than I could ever tell or even know. I have been, among other things, a human rights activist, an impoverished poet, a manual worker, an expert on online education, and a pioneer in Animal Studies.

I was raised on Communism, the grandest of grand narratives. it sought to explain everything but didn’t explain anything very well. I have always missed its dramatic sweep. I wanted big answers for the big questions. I wouldn’t accept the little ones and kept getting in trouble with my teachers.

My father had been a Soviet spy, passing atomic secrets, and the initial years of my life were spent with my nearly destitute family trying to shake the FBI by moving many times a year. My father, a Russian Jew, was impulsive, brilliant, loving, abusive, and seriously mentally ill. My mother, coming from a rather puritanical British background, saw him as a romantic rebel. She was drawn to the Civil Rights movement and was a co-founder of CORE (the Congress on Racial Equality), but the difficulties of survival overwhelmed her idealism. She held our family together with a sort of everyday heroism, and my parents divorced after 18 tempestuous years.

Rather than focusing exclusively on any specialty, I like to draw analogies between domains that appear very far apart. In the 1980s, when I began to write about literature, I was disappointed to discover that I had to spend far more time sorting through commentaries than with poems and stories. The topic of animals in literature and folklore was, however, relatively new. Browsing in used bookshops, I came across eighteenth and nineteenth century encyclopedias of animals, which were an uncharted world of comedy and romance, filled with turkeys that speak Arabic, beavers that build like architects, and dogs that solve murders. They revealed every bit as much about human society as about birds and beasts.

I started writing mostly about human-animal relations and never stopped. Indulging my fondness for paradoxes, I addressed subjects like Nazi animal protection, the modernity of the ravens in the Tower of London, and the Thanksgiving turkey as a sacrificial offering. As for trees, I think of them as just a kind of animal. By now, I have published roughly twenty books, which have been translated into many languages. I often violate academic protocols, not only by addressing broad themes but also by inserting humor and lyricism into my texts. I teach in the college program of the Sing Sing Correctional Facility and the graduate literature program of Mercy University.

There have been two constants in my somewhat untidy life. One is the support of my wife Linda, who has been with me over half a century and whom I cannot thank enough. The other is my writing, which I have worked on continually but am unable to judge. Thanks, reader, for reading this, and I hope you are inspired to read more.

Reviews

[Christine · Rating 3 out of 5]

At times a little dry, but it is an extremely useful book about symbolism and animals.

[Sol · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this at the wrong time. I know too many of these stories.

Each entry in this encyclopedia analyzes the meaning of an animal to human culture and retells their stories and lore. They typically start with ancient mythology and fables, on to medieval and early modern theories and legends, ending on a short observation of their place in modernity. European perspectives are supplemented by relevant Asian and American lore. Most cover birds and mammals, with a surprisingly large number of arthropods, and a scant few reptiles and fish. Plenty of illustrations, many from J.J. Grandville's 19th century fable illustrations.



The stories are decently told, but if you already know Greek/Egyptian mythology and Aesop's fables, you've already read a solid third of this book. While some bibliography is provided in each entry, and sources are sometimes mentioned, no attempt is made to cite every story. The author's animal stories check out, but he's much shakier when it comes to history and zoology. First off, weasels AREN'T FUCKING RODENTS. Normally he notes when he's grouping animals according to traditional categories rather than scientific ones, but he appears not to have realized that weasels and other mustelids are carnivorans. Other errors include underdating the cave painting known as The Sorcerer by an order of magnitude, and not realizing that Laika re-entered the atmosphere less than a year after her death. These errors are unfortunate, and if a dilettante like myself could catch them I would really hope an academic publisher would do so. He also makes occasional bizarre speculations, such as Arachne being a remnant of a pre-Greek goddess. Interesting, but...?

What I learned:
-Everything is a symbol of immortality and fertility
-Everything is a trickster
-Everything is a servant of the devil
-Everything is a symbol of Christ's resurrection
-Amaterasu once hid in a cave for days, plunging the world into night, until the cock crowed, when she emerged to see if the dawn had come without her, returning light to Earth
-Adam and Eve were taught how to bury the dead by a raven
-Beavers were held to castrate themselves to escape hunters seeking their castor glands
-Elephants have been held to worship the moon
-Pliny records that when Pompey killed an elephant in a Roman circus, the watching elephants trumpeted so pitifully that the crowed turned on him, contributing to his downfall to Caesar
-Europeans would inform bees of significant events in their keeper's household
-According to the Iliad, cranes war against pygmies in a distant land
-The ancient Egyptians would award fly brooches to soldiers
-Ancient Indian Panchatantra fables are the basis of the European Renard the Fox stories

[Justin · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I think it could have been organized better, The Mythical Zoo is still an engrossing exploration of a wide variety of animals, and the ways they've been portrayed in our myths, stories, and artwork through the ages. Instead of grouping the entries by taxonomy, geographical region, or even alphabetically, Sax instead opts for a much more subjective classification system ("Almost Human," "Musicians," etc.). It's a strange choice, not made much more intelligible from the introduction, but at least there's an index in the back, in case you want to revisit a particular animal.

Aside from that quibble, the only other flaw worth mentioning is the need for another editing pass. The name of a goddess is spelled both "Hekat" and "Heket" in the same paragraph, instances of the word "or" being used when it should have been "of" (and similar typos) aren't uncommon, and there are even sentences that were clearly rewritten at some point, without the original version being completely deleted. If there were just one or two of these in the whole book, I wouldn't have bothered mentioning it, but clusters of these mistakes show up periodically, like shotgun blasts, and are nearly as jarring.

That aside, there's a lot of fascinating historical/mythological information here. If you have a fondness for animals, and you're curious about how various cultures have portrayed and reacted to them throughout time, you'll find a lot to like in The Mythical Zoo.

[Apostate · Rating 5 out of 5]

An entertaining, informative book that pulls stories & facts about a wide range of animals from many sources. It could have used an editor, though. There are many typos & a few geographical errors: Jericho isn't in or near Turkey, Theseus wanders the Labyrinth & the Minotaur lives there (not the other way 'round, Crimea isn't an island & there isn't an ancient Egyptian city called 'Crocopolis.'

[Nikki · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book would have been better except for the errors I kept finding as I was reading. Things that should have been taken care of during editing.

[Lucy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting if tedious and dry in places, this book covers a lot of territory: myths, legends, popular culture and what part various animals play in all those arenas, either as actual beings or as symbols.
Chapters are: Almost human (ape and monkey, bear, beaver & porcupine, pig); Tricksters (coyote, fox & jackal; hare & rabbit; spider); Sages (bee & wasp; crow, raven & rook; owl; carp & salmon); Just beautiful (ostrich, parrot, peacock & hummingbird); Musicians (cicada, grasshopper & cricket; cuckoo, lark, nightingale & woodpecker); Tooth and claw (lion, panther, jaguar & tiger; wolf); Mermaid's companions (clam, octopus, sea star, squid & crab; dolphin & seal); The barnyard (bull & cow, cock & hen, goat & sheep); Man's best friends (cat, dog); Beasts of burden (ass, camel, llama & mule; horse); Noble adversaries (hart & hind, American buffalo); Tough guys (badger, ermine, groundhog & squirrel; flea, fly & louse; hedgehog; pigeon; rat & mouse); From the underground (ant, beetle, scorpion, snake & lizard, worm); By the seashore (seagull & albatross; swallow; duck, goose & swan; turtle & tortoise); Lost souls (butterfly & moth, English robin & wren, sparrow); Weird and wonderful (bat, frog & toad, the hyena, mantis); Behemoths and leviathans (crocodile, elephant, hippopotamus, whale); Divinities (dove, eagle, rhinoceros). Epilog: what is a human being? Bibliography
Recommended but take your time. It can be slow going.

[Marianne Frenhofer · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was looking for a book about animal symbolism with no connection to any religion in particular. I've found tons about Animal Totems, and though some of them look very interesting, they were all focused on religious practice/divination, and that was not what I wanted for now.
In one of my searches, I've found this volume. I'm still reading it but already can say that it's such an enjoyable book! It doesn't have as many information as an encyclopedia of symbols certainly would, but it's still worth reading. Beautiful cover and vintage illustrations as well.
P.S.: I've just found out that I had already another book by the same author: "Imaginary Animals", which is also great!

[Aline Silva · Rating 5 out of 5]

The most useful book about animal symbolism that I ever read. It is amazing to see how Sax wrote the symbolism of each animal and how it seems clear in mind now. Thanks Boria Sax!

[Kimi · Rating 4 out of 5]

The editor needed to do a better job of catching typos and when words were switched around, but this book was really cool and I enjoyed it.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting amalgam of folklore and literary references to various animals and the symbolic roles they play.

[Megan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found "Mythical Zoo: Animals in Life, Legend and Literature" to be quite an enjoyable read. It was different than I initially thought it was going to be. Instead of being a book recounting various mythical creatures it instead discusses animals that exist today and how they have been used in various literature throughout history. It serves mostly as an encyclopedia which I enjoyed taking my time delving through. One should be aware of this though when reading it because it is more time consuming to read. If you have the time though it's well worth it.

[Pat Welte · Rating 3 out of 5]

It wasn't what I expected, so I was disappointed. It was more of the legends from many different countries and beliefs. I had hoped it was about the different animals and more information.