Why Look at Animals?

by John Berger

John Berger broke new ground with his penetrating writings on life, art and how we see the world around us. Here he explores how the ancient relationship between man and nature has been broken in the modern consumer age, with the animals that used to be at the center of our existence now marginalized and reduced to spectacle. Throughout history, some books have changed the world. They have transformed the way we see ourselves - and each other. They have inspired debate, dissent, war and revolution. They have enlightened, outraged, provoked and comforted. They have enriched lives - and destroyed them. Now Penguin brings you the works of the great thinkers, pioneers, radicals and visionaries whose ideas shook civilization and helped make us who we are.

Genres: Nonfiction, Philosophy, Essays, Animals, Art, Nature, Poetry

128 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

John Peter Berger was an English art critic, novelist, painter and author. His novel G. won the 1972 Booker Prize, and his essay on art criticism Ways of Seeing, written as an accompaniment to a BBC series, is often used as a college text.

Later he was self exiled to continental Europe, living between the french Alps in summer and the suburbs of Paris in winter. Since then, his production has increased considerably, including a variety of genres, from novel to social essay, or poetry. One of the most common themes that appears on his books is the dialectics established between modernity and memory and loss,

Another of his most remarkable works has been the trilogy titled Into Their Labours, that includes the books Pig Earth (1979), Once In Europa (1983) Lilac And Flag (1990). With those books, Berger makes a meditation about the way of the peasant, that changes one poverty for another in the city. This theme is also observed in his novel King, but there his focus is more in the rural diaspora and the bitter side of the urban way of life.

Reviews

[Paula Mota · Rating 3 out of 5]

#nonfictionnovember

"Além de pintarem cenas da vida quotidiana nas paredes dos seus túmulos, os Etruscos esculpiam nas tampas dos seus sarcófagos figuras em tamanho natural representando o morto. Habitualmente, estas figuras estão semi-reclinadas, erguidas sobre um cotovelo, os pés e as pernas relaxados, como num canapé, mas a cabeças e o pescoço alertas, como se focassem o olhar na distância. (...) Mas por muito estereotipado que o restante destas figuras seja, a vivacidade do seu olhar fixado na distância é impressionante. Dado o contexto, a distância é certamente mais temporal do que espacial: a distância é o futuro que os mortos projectavam quando vivos."

[Hazal Çamur · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kurgu dışı kitapları kitaplarla olan maceramda ayrı bir yere koyarım. Kurmaca daima vazgeçilmezim olabilir, fakat kurgu dışı adeta zihnimin besinidir.

Özellikle kitaba adını veren Hayvanlara Niçin Bakarız? denemesi, hayvan ve insan arasındaki düaliteye dayalı ilişkiden kapitalizm ve tüketim toplumuyla birlikte nasıl ayrıştığımızı gözler önüne seriyor. Gözümde en büyük insan günahlarından olan hayvanat bahçeleri ve sirklere, hatta evcil hayvanlara giden yolda tüketim toplumunun ve teknolojinin nasıl bir yol izlediği oldukça duru bir biçimde anlatılıyor.

Kitapta yer alan ve beni etkileyen diğer denemlerse Yiyenler ve Yenenler ile Beyaz Kuş oldu. Yiyenler ve Yenenler'de köy insanlarıyla burjuvalar arasındaki yemek yeme alışkanlıkları üzerinden çarpıcı tespitler yapılıyor. Yemeği bir ihtiyaç olarak değil de keyif aracı olarak gören benim için fazlasıyla aydınlatıcı bir yazı oldu. Beyaz Kuş ise estetik kavramına kötülük penceresinden bakarak şaşırttı.

Cevat Çapan'ın tertemiz çevirisi ve Mehmet Barış Albayrak'ın güzel editörlüğüyle hiçbir tökezlemeye yer bırakmayan bir kurgu dışı kitabı okudum ben. Tavsiye ederim.

[Argos · Rating 5 out of 5]

Su gibi akıp giden bir okuma, hayvanlara bakışımı sorgulatan, düşündüren düşünceler, Cevat Çapan’ın enfes çevirisi, sanat eleştirmeni kimliğinden çok hümanist kimliğini öne çıkararak yazılmış satırlar. Sadece kitabın sonunda yer alan “Ernst Fischer:Bir Filozof ve Ölüm” adlı yazı niye bu kitapta anla(ya)madım.

Yorumlarımda kitaptan alıntılar yapmayı hiç sevmem ama bu kez kendime karşı geliyorum. “Şehir hayatı her zaman doğayı aşırı duygulu bir biçimde görme eğilimi yaratmıştır. Doğa bir bahçe, pencereyle çerçevelenmiş bir manzara ya da bir özgürlük alanı olarak düşünülür. Köylüler, denizciler, göçebeler ise işin aslını bilirler. Doğa enerji ve mücadele demektir. Bize bir şey vadetmeden var olan her şeydir doğa.”

[Zanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

A review is by its nature a meta-text, and so texts already in meta-mode, even if they are not so much about themselves as self-conscious, are resistant to review. I don’t feel able to talk about the texts loosely clumped in this slim volume and how they were able to unfold for me the secrets of certain familiar emotions highly dependent on context: the zoo, the dining room, the field. It would be better to attempt a worthy response, an answer, than a commentary on something so complete.

The decisive theoretical break came with Descartes. Descartes internalised, within man, the dualism implicit in the human relation to animals. In dividing absolutely body from soul, he bequeathed the body to the laws of physics and mechanics, and, since animals were soulless, the animal was reduced to the model of a machine…

Eventually, Descartes' model was surpassed. In the first stages of the industrial revolution, animals were used as machines. As also were children. Later, in the so-called post-industrial societies, they are treated as raw material. Animals required for food are treated like manufactured commodities…

This reduction of the animal, which has a theoretical as well as an economic history, is part of the same process as that by which [hu]m[a]n[s] have been reduced to isolated productive and consuming units…

The conceptual framework in which the Neo-Darwinists and the Creationists debate is of such limited imagination that the contrast with the immensity of the process whose origin they are searching is flagrant. They are like two bands of seven-year-olds who, having discovered a packet of love-letters in an attic, try to piece together the story behind the correspondence. Both bands are ingenious, but the passion of the letters is beyond their competence.

I can’t answer: the only worthy reply is a call to action, or action itself. George Monbiot’s Feral: Rewilding the Land, the Sea, and Human Life is such a call and I urge you to read it. Monbiot is one of those who goes deep and far beyond such elegant namings of the problem as Berger performs here. It may be possible to read this book, shed tears, and carry on calmly, accepting the exploitation and expurgation(?) of animals as regrettable but unavoidable collateral damage in the glorious ascendance of civilization, but then turn to ‘The Eaters and the Eaten’ and try to maintain that position.

If you read this and need help, reading aboutLa Via Campesina might be useful. As time passes, I find myself ever more tightly stretched between urgent passion for high technology and the city, and the suspicion that I must become a farmer…

[Julian Worker · Rating 4 out of 5]

A selection of essays by John Berger, the most famous of which is "Why Look at Animals".

The following passage is very revealing.

"Public zoos came into existence at the beginning of the period which was to see the disappearance of animals from daily life. The zoo to which people go to meet animals, to observe them, to see them, is, in fact, a monument to the impossibility of such encounters."

Animals in zoos constitute a living monument to their disappearance from people's lives. The marginalisation of animals is now being followed by the marginalisation of the social classes who used to be most familiar with animals.

[Abeer Abdullah · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is such a wonderful book. It presents a perspective that's both very foreign and very familiar to me, at it's core its naked humanity which is something I understand but have not seen since childhood. It made me think of man's relationship to nature in a way I've never thought of before, I'm not a person who is exposed to nature in the slightest sense seeing as how I live in a city built on a desert and always feel that I have been so alienated from my culture, a culture derived entirely from the desert.
This book doesnt seem to really presume what the effects of man's isolation are, it clearly ties it back to capitalism but it isnt preachy or presumptuous, it doesnt solve or even hypothesize, it just draws the world as we know it in a much clearer simpler way that really opened my eyes.

Reading it made me feel like someone had opened my own chest for me and made me look at the nature of my being which I had grown so unfamiliar with.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

It almost feels as if I'm abusing my "unexpectedly terrific" shelf these days, but this book, another in the Penguin "Great Ideas" series, which I discovered recently in the local foreign language bookstore here in Madrid, really does merit its place. Like all the books in the series, it is (appealingly?) short* (100 pages), but the quality of the writing more than compensates for its brevity.

Perhaps shamefully, I had never heard of John Berger before stumbling across this collection of his work. A little googling points to a fairly extensive body of work, which I look forward to exploring further. The book comprises eight essays, one poem, and a concluding vignette of the philosopher Ernst Fischer, a personal friend of the author. As the title essay suggests, most of the pieces deal with the relationship between humans and animals; they range from the gently playful "A Mouse Story" (a man, a mousetrap, and several murine protagonists), to more elegaic pieces such as "The White Bird" and "Field", both of which use the commonplace (a wooden bird carved by a peasant of the Haute Savoie, a field near the author's home) as starting point for more general rumination on aesthetics. The poem "They are the Last" is a surprisingly moving appreciation of cows. Perhaps because of the quality of the writing, each of these pieces has a low-key charm which I enjoyed thoroughly.

But the meat of the book (no pun intended) lies in the three longer essays: "Why Look at Animals?", "Ape Theatre", and "The Eaters and the Eaten", which, taken together, provide a thoughtful, unexpectedly engrossing, investigation of the relationship between humans and animals. Although Berger's purpose is undoubtedly didactic, precisely what I found appealing about these essays is the lack of any kind of preaching tone. In contrast to, say, someone like Peter Singer, whose general air of moral superiority I personally find completely offputting, and whose preachy tone diminishes the cogency of his arguments, Berger's approach is far more low-key. And because of that, more effective, at least for this reader. Whereas the extremity of some of Singer's arguments just makes me fling him aside after a while, Berger writes with a sly charm that is beguiling, with the result that I found these essays thought-provoking, and not easily dismissed.

Which, I imagine, would please the author. I did not expect to like this collection of essays nearly as much as I did. Try them for yourself - you might feel the same way.


*: I think the marketing folks at Penguin are quite smart - they know full well that a 300-page volume that advertised itself as containing "great ideas" would be a tough sell. Whereas the slim volumes that they have assembled are actually pretty appealing, even if some (Orwell's essay on "Books v Cigarettes" or on "The Decline of the English Murder", for example), though not without a certain charm, seem to stretch the definition of "great ideas" more than a little

[Kate♡ · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5stars

actually wicked eye opening, but so SO short

[Yani · Rating 5 out of 5]

¿Tienen mascotas? ¿Van al zoológico o los odian, como yo? Este ensayo es uno de esos textos que se leen con incomodidad porque uno se identifica con el tema en discusión. La mirada del autor es muy interesante, abarca tópicos en los que nunca había pensado (como los juguetes con formas de animales que son comunes entre los niños) y genera preguntas. Recomendable.

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kahdeksan pienen esseen kokoelma, jossa JBerger katsoo sitä katsetta, jolla me ihmiset katsomme paitsi eläimiä myös eläinten katseen ja katsomisen kautta itseämme. Miltä luonto näyttää kun olemme tehneet viimeiset vuosisadat kaikkemme vieraannuttaaksemme sen itsestämme? Miten itse katsomme peltoa, kun tasoristeyksen puomit ovat alhaalla, kun yhtäkkiä aukean läpi kirmaa jänis tai kurkiparista toinen nostaa kaulaansa korkeammalle? Mitä katse ja katsominen kertoo luontosuhteestamme?

Berger jättää paljon ilmaa esseidensä rivien väliin – tämä onkin loistopari aiemmin tänä vuonna lukemani Nancy Fraserin Kannibaalikapitalismille (Vastapaino 2025, suom. Sauli Havu & Danika Harju), joka avaa tieteellisemmin ja teoreettisemmin kapitalismin tapaa toiseuttaa, alistaa ja aidata sekä luonto että ihmisen luontosuhde. Fraserin monikriisiteoreettisen taustan päälle luettuna Berger tarjoaa välillä jopa lyyrisen lähestymistavan tähän samaan tematiikkaan: miten ihminen pyrkii alistamaan ja lopulta eksotisoimaan alistetun ominaisuudet jonkinlaiseksi ikuiseksi haaveeksi paluusta Paratiisiin.

Bergerin esseet ovat pinnalta yllättävänkin helppo- ja nopealukuisia (pl. nimikkoteksti, joka poukkoilee viehättävästi vaatien hieman enemmän keskittymistä), mutta jotka aukeavat filosofisesti jokaisella lukukerralla yhä syvemmin. Lisämausteen antaa teoksen lopusta löytyvät suomentaja Roni Gr��nin loistavasti teosta taustoittavat sanat, jotka avaavat Bergiriä tuntemattomammallekin (eli siis mm. minulle) kirjoittajan sielunmaisemaa ja elämänvaiheita pidemminkin.

Lempeä, kiinnostava ja ehdottoman inspiroiva, kielellisesti upea ja ihana pieni kirja. Tulen palaamaan näihin teksteihin vielä monta kertaa.

[emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

'Language allows men to reckon with each other as with themselves. (In the confirmation made possible by language, human ignorance and fear may also be confirmed. Whereas in animals fear is a response to signal, in men it is endemic.)'

How many Bergers can I shamelessly devour before the year ends? I'm mad about this quite alright lad . This particular essay is part of his About Looking collection. Will have to get my hands on that book ASAP.

'Book 17 of the Iliad opens with Menelaus standing over the corpse of Patroclus to prevent the Trojans stripping it. Here Homer uses animals as metaphoric references, to convey, with irony or admiration, the excessive or superlative qualities of different moments. Without the example of animals, such moments would have remained indescribable. “Menelaus bestrode his body like a fretful mother cow standing over the first calf she has brought into the world.'

Am I the only one who gets briefly excited when 'Patroclus' appears on any text?

'Anthropomorphism was the residue of the continuous use of animal metaphor. In the last two centuries, animals have gradually disappeared. Today we live without them. And in this new solitude, anthropomorphism makes us doubly uneasy.'

Just look at how brilliantly Berger writes (so precisely (and well-constructed, well-punctuated with appropriately dramatic pauses which I love and appreciate), without sounding patronising or like a pompous fuck). I'm extremely impressed. So much so I can't feel my knees anymore. They gone .

“London housewife Barbara Carter won a ‘grant a wish’ charity contest, and said she wanted to kiss and cuddle a lion. Wednesday night she was in a hospital in shock and with throat wounds. Mrs Carter, 46, was taken to the lions’ compound of the safari park at Bewdley, Wednesday. As she bent forward to stroke the lioness, Suki, it pounced and dragged her to the ground. Wardens later said. ‘We seem to have made a bad error of judgment. We have always regarded the lioness as perfectly safe’."

Considered me tickled through. Unintended dark humour? Checked.

'Yet in the zoo the view is always wrong. Like an image out of focus. One is so accustomed to this that one scarcely notices it any more; or, rather, the apology habitually anticipates the disappointment, so that the latter is not felt. And the apology runs like this: What do you expect? It’s not a dead object you have come to look at, it’s alive. It’s leading its own life. Why should this coincide with its being properly visible? Yet the reasoning of this apology is inadequate. The truth is more startling.'

'All sites of enforced marginalisation — ghettos, shanty towns, prisons, madhouses, concentration camps — have something in common with zoos. But it is both too easy and too evasive to use the zoo as a symbol. The zoo is a demonstration of the relations between man and animals; nothing else. The marginalisation of animals is today being followed by the marginalisation and disposal of the only class who, throughout history, has remained familiar with animals and maintained the wisdom which accompanies that familiarity: the middle and small peasant. The basis of this wisdom is an acceptance of the dualism at the very origin of the relation between man and animal. The rejection of this dualism is probably an important factor in opening the way to modern totalitarianism. But I do not wish to go beyond the limits of that unprofessional, unexpressed but fundamental question asked of the zoo.'

And I shall repeat myself – I need Berger's About Looking .

[Neli Krasimirova · Rating 4 out of 5]

(belki üşenmez bilgisayı açarsam, yazarım elbet)

[Nora · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was really depressing. I’m mostly referring to the title essay when I say this. The other essays varied in quality and impact, showing a large variation in style. But the 26 pages of «Why look at animals?» were powerful, inquisitive, confronting, and agonizing. I wasn’t convinced by every single train of thought, but many of the ideas are recognizable from the familiar and were easy to be impacted by with the right delivery. After reading this at 2 AM it was hard to go through the night and following day under the burdening conviction that our collective idea of animals is ruined. It took a toll on me.

I wanted to check out this work as a self-appointed supplement to a university course I’m currently enrolled in: «Course in Animal Research in Norway», giving theoretical and practical qualifications for performing experimental procedures with model animals and thorough ethical evaluation. I almost wrote a long and derailed account about the ambivalence I feel about this, but suffice to say that I find the topic interesting to learn about but hard to enter the conceptual standpoint of. Squished between the theoretical course load, the guilt and sorrow induced by «WLAA?», and a sprinkle of nausea served by Sartre (another current read), I could feel myself spiraling down an undesirable mental path.

At first I considered finally picking up «The Animal Therefore I Am» by Jacques Derrida to do a deep dive into the topic, but no. I feel a desperate need for a palate cleanser and will try to find something cozy or fun off my shelves.

On a lighter note, here’s a quote from the essay «Opening a gate». This was a much lighter and somewhat hopeful read, but still related to the topic.

«We live our daily lives in a constant exchange with the set of daily appearances surrounding us - often they are very familiar, sometimes they are unexpected and new, but they always confirm us in our lives . (…)
Yet it can happen, suddenly, unexpectedly, and most frequently in the half-light-of-glimpses, that we catch sight of another visible order which intersects with ours and has nothing to do with it. (…) We come upon a part of the visible which wasn’t destined for us. Perhaps it was destined for night-birds, reindeer, ferrets, eels, whales…»

It is easy to go about life as if the human world is the only one that is. Should I do laundry tomorrow or on Wednesday? Would this job position be a suitable stepping stone in my career? In what ways will the economy be affected by the current political climate?

We shouldn’t blame ourselves for this kind of egocentrism. As the quote says, nearly every impression we encounter in our daily lives will naturally confirm it. Still, it’s important to realize that our way of existence is only one out of many. Take a moment right now to imagine what it is like to be a puffin bird, perched on a shelf on the mountainside, overseeing the vast stretch of ocean while feeling the tug of the wind and light spray of salt water on its feathers. What about a resting shark gliding steadily through the dark, open sea. A termite depositing pieces of soil trying to construct the channels of a new mound. A bacterium in the act of dividing within the gastro-intestinal tract. Try to glimpse into another creature’s point of view and share their «umwelt», just for a moment.

[la poesie a fleur de peau · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Seja como for, vivemos num mundo de sofrimento em que cresce o mal, um mundo cujos acontecimentos não confirmam o nosso Ser, um mundo a que é preciso resistir. É nesta situação que o momento estético oferece uma esperança. Poder achar belos um cristal ou uma papoila significa que estamos menos sozinhos, que estamos mais profundamente inseridos na existência do que aquilo que o curso de uma única vida nos poderia levar a crer."

Excerto do ensaio "O Pássaro Branco", John Berger

***

A escrita de John Berger fascina-me pelo facto de conter dois dos princípios que mais me interessam explorar: por um lado a clareza de expressão, por outro a capacidade de estimular os sentidos do leitor. Utilizando um discurso acessível e claro, Berger é capaz de direccionar a nossa atenção para situações e objectos que já fazem parte da nossa vida e que são do nosso conhecimento, mas faz incidir sobre eles uma nova luz que altera a percepção que fazemos deles.

[Ana Marinho · Rating 5 out of 5]

Não tinha quaisquer expectativas relativamente a este livro e terminei-o deliciada. Adorei a forma como John Berger nos apresenta, através dos animais, comportamentos humanos, desde a necessidade do amor até ao consumismo. Somos animais: não nos devemos esquecer deste facto e devemos olhar para os animais para os compreender a eles e a nós próprios. Em certos momentos, Berger era verdadeiramente poético na sua exposição de ideias. Foi uma agradável surpresa!

[Kayıp Rıhtım]

Eser Berger’ın 9 yazısını içeriyor. Bunlardan sadece şiir ve öykü olan bölümler de mevcutken Ernst Fischer: Bir Filozof ve Ölüm adlı adeta saygı duruşu olan anısıyla da sonlanıyor. Hayvanlara Niçin Bakarız? bölümünde doğa, hayvan davranışları, kapitalizm hakkında sarsıcı eleştiriler var. Bu eleştirileri farklı türdeki yazınıyla da daha hüzünlü bir hale getirmiş. Eseri okurken Görme Biçimleri’ndeki gibi bir dil beklemiyor sizi, daha üstten bir eleştiri/bakış açısından ziyade acı var eserde. Çıkarımlarının doğruluğundan mutsuz, içerlemiş ve romantik bir Berger var.

Eserin başında Bir Fare Hikâyesi ile yalnız yaşayan bir adamın farelerle imtihanından söz ediyor Berger. Evindeki son istilacı farenin de gitmesini hüzünle izleyen bir adamla tanışıyoruz öyküde. Sonraki yazılarda dil böylesine kibar olmuyor, hayvan kültleri incelemeleri ile başlıyor eleştiri silsilesi. Resim sanatının ilk konusunun hayvanlar olmasından ve yine bu resimlerin de büyük olasılıkla hayvan kanından yapılmış olduğunu söylüyor yazar. Hayvanı besleyen, seven, öldüren ve tüketen insandan; hayvandan uzaklaşan ve korkan insan tipine nasıl ulaştığımızı anlatıyor. Evcil hayvanların evlerde esir edilip beslenmesini doğaya bir biçimde yaklaşmak kaygısı olduğunu gösteriyor. Ama ne yazık ki evlerimizde beslediğimiz hayvanların gerçek olmadığını, bir çeşit kopyalarımız olduğu gösteriyor. Fare tutmayan kedileri, ava çıkmayan köpekleri bize benzetiyor Berger. Yemeğini elde etmeyen, hazıra alışmış, kendinden ve doğasından uzaklaşmış evcil hayvanlar olduğumuzu döne döne yüzümüze vuruyor.

Uygar Özdemir

İncelemenin tamamı: https://kayiprihtim.com/inceleme/hayv...

[José · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really quite enjoyable, "Why Look at Animals?" is a collection of essays by art criticism pretty boy John Berger, filled with beautiful considerations (mostly) focused on the sheer observation of animals and their interaction with their surroundings and man. While drawing from a number of common places (which is already somewhat paramount to "Ways of Seeing"), John Berger stretches and deranges them into a new perspective, creating novelty from images that feel largely familiar. His writing, as usual, feels somewhat a tad bit too demagogical and spiritual with no real reason to be so, but beneath this layer of what can be seen as arrogance still lies a pretty good book.

The last essay in the book, existing separate from "Why Look at Animals?", is "Ernst Fischer: A Philosopher and Death". It exists more as a report on the last days of Ernst Fischer, which were spent with his wife and a couple of friends (including, obviously, John Berger). It is told beautifully and perhaps, together with "A Mouse Story" (the opening essay/story), stands as the best part of the book.

[aslı · Rating 5 out of 5]

Yazarın ilk okuduğum kitabıydı ve her bölüm ayrı okuma doygunluğu yaşattı, bu sebeple son olmayacağını biliyorum.

(PS: Hayvanat bahçelerine gitmeyin...)

[Cintia Andrade · Rating 4 out of 5]

O ensaio que dá título a esta coleção é simplesmente magnífico, coisa de ler chorando mesmo.

[Selma Pirim · Rating 5 out of 5]

bir insanın kaldıramayacağı görüntülere uyandığımız bir sabahın peşine bitti. ne söz, ne nefes, ne dua hiçbiri şey bırakmadılar.

[Passive Apathetic · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bu kitap insana bir rüyayı okurmuş hissi veriyor. Anlatılan bir rüyayı okumak gibi değil, anlatılmayan bir rüyayı okumak gibi. Bitince uyanıyorsunuz. O yüzden üç senede okudum bu kitabı, bitsin istemedim. Özellikle hoşuma giden birkaç yeri var, geri dönüp okuyorum kaçtır. Ama paylaşmaya kıyamıyorum. Okuyun.

[Frederik · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful collection of short essays and stories by John Berger on the relationship between men and nature, i.e. often animals. The most emotionally touching was the opening story, "A mouse story". A man is bothered by mouses in his house and uses a mouse trap to capture them. In examining them when captured he finds certain human and familiar characteristics. Just like the mic, the man longs for freedom. The title essay is an excellent and poignant observation on the zoos. "Everywhere animals disappear. In zoos they constitute the living monument to their own disappearance." Excellent and still very relevant stuff. The book also contains a separate story, about the last day in the life of Ernst Fisher, Marxist philosopher and friend of the author.

[julia · Rating 1 out of 5]

1.5 Stars.

Reading this made me realise, once again, that I have neither the mind nor the patience for philosophy and philosophical ramblings.

I bought this thinking it would shine a light on the relationship between humans and animals, on the way we treat animals, maybe even offer some idea or the attempt of an explanation as to why we actively exploit, harm and kill those perceived 'lesser' than ourselves the way we do. However, this was a very random collection of Berger's essays that I saw no real connectivity in; animals did not even feature in all of them. I feel this was falsely marketed and, in effect, very bleh.

[Andre Aguiar]

dificilmente alguém olha para um rato por tanto tempo quanto este homem o olha.
ou vice-versa.

[trovateOrtensia · Rating 2 out of 5]

Suggerirei di riformulare così il titolo di questo libro: Perché Berger guarda gli animali? Meglio sarebbe (per tutti gli incauti lettori) se guardasse la televisione in silenzio. Ho trovato questo libro molto irritante. Non solo perché è un insieme di esangui pensieri(ni) sul concetto di natura e sul mondo animale, una specie di inutile bignami di antropologia con goffe ancorché inadeguate incursioni nella filosofia. Ma soprattutto perché tale pochezza di contenuti è cesellata, infiocchettata da Berger ed elargita sulle scarne paginette quasi si trattasse di una verità originale e inaudita di cui fa dono al lettore.
Poiché la sofferenza si sopporta meglio in compagnia, vi regalo alcune frasi di Berger, con l’avvertenza di meditarle con moderazione, perché vi si potrebbero fondere le sinapsi per lo sforzo. ”Gli animali vengono messi al mondo e sono esseri senzienti e mortali. In questo somigliano all’uomo. Nella loro anatomia visibile (…), nelle abitudini, nella percezione del tempo, nelle capacità fisiche, essi differiscono dall’uomo. Sono allo stesso tempo simili e diversi.”
Opperò, e questo solo a pagina 23. Chissà più avanti… E infatti a pagina 48 le cose si complicano: “Lo zoo è un luogo dove sono raccolte quante più specie e varietà animali possibile, affinché possano essere viste, osservate e studiate”.
E ancora, l’impietoso Berger infierisce poco oltre con “L’atto delle creazione implica una separazione.” per poi lanciarci questa fulminante considerazione: “Il consumismo è intrinseco alla cultura borghese del XIX secolo. Il consumismo soddisfa un bisogno culturale oltre che economico”. E qui mi fermo, perché credo di aver reso l’idea.

[Olya Grigoreva · Rating 5 out of 5]

Так что, зачем смотреть? В книге действительно половина объема посвящена животным, и это завораживающие главы. Это совсем не тот ожидаемый нами ракурс. Кроме взгляда художника, у Бёрджера есть и философская риторика.

Хочется уловить жанр, которым написаны эссе. Не получается. Временами эссе превращаются в стихи (Они — последние), временами в прощальное письмо другу (философу Эрнсту Фишеру). И единственное общее — точка говорящего. Бёрджер описывает состояния, которым нет названия. Рисует сцену, погружает туда читателя, и уже оттуда, изнутри, показывает, как бы задавая вопрос: ну как? чувствуешь?

Интересно, что я зашла на Бёрджера с его эссе, а не с легендарной критической работы «Искусство видеть». Но рада, что впереди зима и много его нечитанных книг

Рекомендую в обязательную копилку всем-всем, кто работает в жанре эссе.

[Graychin · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m a sucker for books with titles phrased as questions. This was an odds and ends collection of John Berger pieces that left me mostly unimpressed. The opening tale (‘A Mouse Story’) was fair. The title essay was a bit of a disappointment, though it offered a couple interesting thoughts (e.g. how much poorer Homer would read without his elaborate similes drawn from animal behavior). My favorite piece was ‘Ape Theatre.’ I don’t know Berger beyond this volume, but to my taste he seems too enthralled by socialism and Freudianism for his own good. Also, I don’t care for his poetry.

[Martin Hare Michno · Rating 5 out of 5]

The way in which John Berger saw and thought about life and nature is different to the traditional ways in such an inspiring manner. He seemed to be constantly in love with Earth and its creatures, even his own existence. But yet, his writing is more often thoughtful and calm than it is passionate. Berger exposes a view of modern life in the long history of evolution and humankind, a life which is so importantly post-Earthrise.

[cafejuntoalibros · Rating 4 out of 5]

Una singular forma de analizar a través de este ensayo los aspectos más humanos desde sus inicios, contrastando con la corrupción del alma del sur humano con la invitación a corregir todos aquellos aspectos que requerimos para volvernos amigos, no solo con los animales, la naturaleza sino también con nosotros mismos y lo que nos rodea para construir una nueva sociedad. Recomendado.

[belisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

her zamanki berger