Buffalo Gals and Other Animal Presences

by Ursula K. Le Guin

The bestselling author of the Earthsea trilogy, The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed presents a collection of short stories and poems that takes the reader into a magical, whimsical world where the line between human and animal is quite different from our world. Winner of the Hugo and World Fantasy Awards.
Contents:
"Come into animal presence / Denise Levertov --
Buffalo gals, won't you come out tonight --
Three rock poems: Basalt --Flints --
Mt. St. Helens/ Omphalos --
Mazes --
Wife's stories --
Five vegetable poems --
Torrey pines reserve --
Lewis and Clarke and after --
West Texas --
Xmas over --
Crown of Laurel --
Direction of the road --
Vaster than empires and more slow --
Seven bird and beast poems --
What is going on in the Oaks --
For Ted --
Found poem --
Totem --
Winter downs --
Man eater--
Sleeping out --
White donkey --
Horse camp --
Four cat poems --
Tabby Lorenzo --
Black Leonard in negative space --
Conversation with a silence --
For Leonard, Darko, and Burton Watson --
Schrodinger's cat --
"Author of the Acacia seeds" and other extracts from the journal of the journal of the association of Therolinguistics --
May's lion --
Eighth elegy, from "Duino elegies" of R.M. Rilke --
She unnames them.


"A spirited, gracefully polemical introduction and the final story, "She Unnames Them", frame this collection of fiction and poetry, placing it in a natural but unsentimental light. These are not really "talking animal" stories: they are about human apprehension of natural creation (including rocks and plants) and the relations this apprehension governs; or, how communication makes communities. Seven of ten stories and seven of 19 poems having already been published, while a couple of pieces read like working drafts. Among the best pieces is the title story; like many of the others, it works its effect through a reversal of the usual (human) point of view."--Library Journal.

Genres: Fantasy, Fiction, Short Stories, Poetry, Science Fiction, Animals, Speculative Fiction

236 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published September 1, 1987

About the author

Ursula K. Le Guin published twenty-two novels, eleven volumes of short stories, four collections of essays, twelve books for children, six volumes of poetry and four of translation, and has received many awards: Hugo, Nebula, National Book Award, PEN-Malamud, etc. Her recent publications include the novel Lavinia, an essay collection, Cheek by Jowl, and The Wild Girls. She lived in Portland, Oregon.

She was known for her treatment of gender (The Left Hand of Darkness, The Matter of Seggri), political systems (The Telling, The Dispossessed) and difference/otherness in any other form. Her interest in non-Western philosophies was reflected in works such as "Solitude" and The Telling but even more interesting are her imagined societies, often mixing traits extracted from her profound knowledge of anthropology acquired from growing up with her father, the famous anthropologist, Alfred Kroeber. The Hainish Cycle reflects the anthropologist's experience of immersing themselves in new strange cultures since most of their main characters and narrators (Le Guin favoured the first-person narration) are envoys from a humanitarian organization, the Ekumen, sent to investigate or ally themselves with the people of a different world and learn their ways.

Reviews

[Peter Tillman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rating is for the novella, "Buffalo Gals, Won't You Come Out Tonight," which is wonderful. Le Guin at her very best. Won the Hugo (for best novelette) and World Fantasy awards, 1988. I need to reread this collection! Great cover art, too. Sadly, our library doesn't own one, & it's OOP. But there are many other reprints: http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cg...

I didn't much care for the illustrated version, https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6... . But don't miss the title story! Absolutely not to be missed. I get something new out of every reread. On my 100 Best list for good reason.

[Nicky · Rating 4 out of 5]

I imagine most of these stories are collected somewhere else by now, but I was also interested in this book for the introductions to each story, which may not be collected elsewhere. It’s interesting to see what Le Guin feels the stories are about, what she thinks is important to know. For example, with ‘The Wife’s Tale’, she apparently warns audiences that it is not a werewolf story at the beginning. But I thought that mistake was kind of the point? That flip-flop moment of, oh. I got it wrong. I assumed.

I’d read most of the stories before, but the poems were new. Ursula Le Guin always has a beautiful clarity about her writing, capturing mannerisms and small moments, crystallising it… and sometimes her plots feel too clever for me, but most of these are pretty accessible, and the introductions helped.

Originally posted here.

[John Defrog: global citizen, local gadfly · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m at the stage now that when I come across a Le Guin book, I pick it up. This one is slightly obscure in that it’s a republication of her award-winning novella “Buffalo Gals Won’t You Come Out Tonight”, bundled together with other Le Guin short stories and poems that reflect a similar theme to that of the title track – namely, the idea that animals, plants and all of nature speak clearly to us, but we are too self-absorbed to listen to them, or even acknowledge that they can communicate with us, or that they have anything worth saying.

The title track alone is worth the price of admission – a story in which a young girl survives an airplane crash in the Southwestern desert, enters the dream world of animal folklore and is rescued by the trickster Coyote. Other stories tale on the animal’s POV in classic tropes (werewolves, lab rats, horse camps). One indulges in academic discussions of animal languages, while another story (set in Le Guin’s Hainish Cycle universe) chronicles interstellar explorers encountering a planet where the wilderness is alive in more ways than one.

For me, the poems are the weak link here – they’re okay, but the stories are the main attraction. And with a couple of exceptions, they’re classic Le Guin, evoking a wide range of emotions (suspense, melancholy, humor) as each story unfolds. The ecological theme may be a little too ‘on point’ for some readers, but that’s their problem. For myself, it’s always nice to find a book you didn’t know existed by a favorite author – it’s even nicer when it turns out to be a hidden gem. This is one of those.

[Abe Something · Rating 5 out of 5]

You’ve got to love the Earth for this one. I mean, you’ve got to be the type who goes crazy for poetry about rocks and trees.

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ursula K. Le Guin's Buffalo Gals and Other Animal Presences is a revelation. All the stories, poems, plus two novelettes in this collection deal with worlds seen through the eyes of animals and even vegetation. As the author writes in the introduction:

And for the people Civilization calls "primitive," "savage," or "undeveloped," including young children, the continuity, interdependence, and community of all life, all forms of being on earth, is a lived fact, made conscious in narrative (myth, ritual, fiction). This continuity of existence, neither benevolent nor cruel itself, is fundamental to whatever morality may be built upon it. Only Civilization builds its morality by denying its foundation.

I particularly liked the novelettes -- "Buffalo Gals, Won't You Come Out Tonight" and "Vaster Than Empires and More Slow." About half of the short stories and poems are also of uniform excellence. Which is not bad for a work cobbled together from previously published material over a long period of time.

[Mark Oppenlander · Rating 2 out of 5]

In Buffalo Gals and Other Animal Presences, Ursula K. Le Guin got the bright idea of gathering a bunch of her stories (and poems) that deal with the world as seen by animals, plants, rocks, etc. The common denominator in most of the tales and poems is that the point of view is not human.

For example, the lead-off story, "Buffalo Gals Won't You Come Out Tonight," blends human and animal ideals in a neo-indigenous mythological way. A young girl survives a plane crash in the desert, and is adopted by Coyote. She falls over from human time into animal time, taking on the perspectives of the creatures with whom she sojourns. It's an interesting conceit, but the final payoff didn't affect me as much emotionally as I might have hoped.

A significant percentage of the works collected in this book have been anthologized before, so although there are a couple of strong stories (e.g., "The Author of the Acacia Seeds," "Vaster than Empires and More Slow") they were ones with which I was already familiar. Re-reading them was pleasant, but not revelatory. Most of the poetry was unmemorable, with the ironic exception of a couple of non-Le Guin pieces, included as epigraphs (one is by Denise Levertov, and another is by Rainer Maria Rilke).

The collection seems to be primarily a novelty act. If there is purposefulness here, it is in the idea that the universe is larger than our limited human minds can conceive, and that even on our own planet, we are but one small part of a much grander ecosystem. If we could empathize more strongly with trees, cats, horses, rocks, and so forth, we might be better stewards of these things - items we act as if we own or control, but in truth know little about.

I am being generous with my critique, largely because I love Le Guin's work and wish to give her the benefit of the doubt. However, the truth is that this is not her best work, and that the sharpest pieces here are also available elsewhere. This is non-essential Le Guin.

[Simms · Rating 4 out of 5]

In some ways, as someone trying to read through Le Guin chronologically, this was a little disappointing: only a few of the stories are original to this animal-themed collection, and I thought they were lackluster (not even considering the poetry, which never does anything for me). On the other hand, taken as a whole and judged on its standalone merit, the collection is quite good, as many of the stories it reprints from The Wind's Twelve Quarters and The Compass Rose are bangers, including "The Wife's Story," "Mazes," "The Direction of the Road," "Vaster Than Empires and More Slow," and one of my very favorite Le Guin stories, "The Author of the Acacia Seeds." May be better to read her earlier collections instead, but if you find this one first there is some good stuff inside.

[Astrid · Rating 5 out of 5]

Le Guin & I would have had a meaningful friendship. Sometimes u meet people & u just know that they know. Le Guin knows. Reading these stories felt like touching fingertips with someone who sees u.
The unspoken understanding we have with animals, our family on this earth, is what this book is about about.
I've heard before "animals are born as animals & not as humans because they no longer have any moral lessons to learn. They're born pure, innocent, & knowing."
Le Guin understands this, & she extends the barrier-less empathy to our plant friends as well.

[lou]

not my favorite leguin, but i cant bear to give her a rating under 4 stars so i simply won't! despite it's flaws it does demonstrate all of the things i know and love leguin for: complex philosophical ideas, close examination of society, challenging that which we take for granted, etc.

[Mikayla · Rating 5 out of 5]

Buffalo Gals is a story that I know is going to stick with me for a long time. One of those pieces of writing that feels like a dream when read, hazy and strange, but with a sharp lucidity underneath, a sense of anxiety that follows you with each page.

[Amber · Rating 4 out of 5]

The last short story ("She Unames Them") is that fourth star. I'm going to hold on to that beauty as long as I can. As for the book as a whole, each story and poem is beautiful on its own, but together, ingested and devoured all at once, it was quite heavy and melancholy. And not because I didn't get it... but because *I did*.

[Anthony Peter · Rating 3 out of 5]

This collection from Le Guin contains both stories and poems themed by all being about animals or non-human consciousness.

However, the poems that constitute half the collection are on a wavelength with which I was not able to connect, so this brief review can recommend only the stories.

Le Guin’s storytelling makes demands on her readers: we have to spend time allowing ourselves to be drawn into her narrative worlds until we twig what’s going on – that a girl is running with coyotes, that an entity is conscious of being played with in a maze, that a she-wolf discovers her husband is human; trees move, grasslands are fearful, horses that see ‘horse camp’ from their own point of view, and there’s an intriguing exploration of ‘therolinguistics’. And the last two stories I specially liked: one about a woman’s relationship with ‘a lion’ and the other about Eve quietly rebelling against Adam – not that he is aware enough of her to notice!

Subversive, challenging, good-natured and good-humoured – Le Guin continues to push my imagination into new regions of understanding.

[Lily · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like all anthologies, this one was hit or miss - but the hits were so deep that I feel this book has gently rewired the way I think of other living and non-living things on this planet.

[Kate · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ursula Le Guin is such a consummate word smith that her books are never boring.

But I just couldn't get into this one. It's written from that modern-Indian-with-Coyote-in-sneakers POV, which isn't exactly my cup of tea.

From the back cover:
"By climbing up into his own head and shutting out every voice but his own, 'civilized man' has gone deaf. He can't hear the wolf calling him brother -- not master, but brother. He can't hear the earth calling him child -- not father, but son."

And:
"Ursula K. Le Guin does hear the animals' voices, and as she shows us in this luminous collection of one novella, ten stores and eighteen poems, they are magical, fascinating and terrifying. In the title novella, a child survives a plane crash and enters the Dream Time of primitive myths, where the coyote knows secrets about that world -- and this one. In other stores we journey further into unknown realms, like the deep space planet where only fear dwells, or the unfamiliar worlds of wolves, rats, and horses whose realities make us question our own."

I didn't like the poetry at all, and neither did I care much for the prose writings. All in all, a disappointment for me, as normally I adore this author's work.

[kari · Rating 3 out of 5]

“they seemed far closer than when their names had stood between myself and them like a clear barrier: so close that my fear of them and their fear of me became one same fear.”

this was kind of exactly what i expected it would be—just a lovely little collection about animals, or “animal presences.” Le Guin’s writing is still kind of disarming in its bluntness and objectivity, never seeming to get too close or too involved with its subjects in a way that leaves me often feeling curiously distant as well. but this is undeniably at the very least an interesting, if not perhaps expressly moving, exploration of nature and the natural presences that surround us.

[Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of short stories and poems, all with an animal theme. The poems were a bit obscure, but the stories were good. The best is the title story, which is about a girl who survives a plane crash and is taken care of by wild animals who can talk to her. Turns out we could all talk to animals at one point but have forgotten how. "Vaster than Empires, but More Slow"--about thinking/feeling plants on an alien planet--is also good. Every piece resonates with the goodness and power of the non-human world, how much we take for granted, and how much we can learn from them.

[Thoraiya · Rating 5 out of 5]

These stories and poems are wonderful. One of the stories, "The Author of the Acacia Seeds and Other Extracts From the Journal of Therolinguistics," I've read before.

Not sure where. But I loved it just as much the second time around. And it's because of this story that I can't understand why Ken Liu's "The Bookmaking Habits of Select Species" has been so lauded; no offence to him in the slightest, I am a Liu fan, but Ursula already wrote that story, better, in 1974.

[Saski · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ah, Ms Le Guin, I would devour anything you put before me, even short stories and essays. In this collection we see her ability to look from incredibly diverse perspectives, forcing us to perceive life in so many different ways. My personal favorites: Mazes, The Wife's Story, and The Direction of the Road, this last fills my mind whenever I am walking, biking, or driving past trees and I fear for them.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

My favorite author (bar none), Ursula K. Le Guin, is hard to categorize. Her stories here, some fantasy, some science fiction--she prefers the label "speculative fiction"--all share an animal perspective--or a shift in perspective from the dominant human one. Some are short stories; one is probably a novella--she disrespects others' labels in beautiful ways.

[Joe Hay · Rating 4 out of 5]

This volume is silly in conception but enjoyable and moving just the same.

The obvious intention was to publish the 40ish-page title story - which is breathtaking and funny and tragic all in one - but then puff up the volume with a few other stories, some poems, some drawings, some introductory passages in italics, and a lot of blank pages. The content is mostly excellent, but also mostly had appeared elsewhere already at the time of publication. I'd say, in addition to Buffalo Gals, May's Lion was my favorite. Tears streaming down my face, after both of those.

You can even read the title story elsewhere now, because UKLG's stories have all been repackaged and republished in big volumes. But I think this volume, as trivial as it may be, is light and printed with nice big text, which is perfect for, say, taking on a camping trip.

[Reader · Rating 2 out of 5]

This writing is so dry. I was hoping I'd be more of a Le Guin fan because I like her themes and viewpoint, but most of the stories are just pretty boring. The best poem in here is the Rilke one. "Vaster than Empires and More Slow" is well done and a decent story, besides having such a great title. "The Author of the Acacia Seeds" is probably my favorite, but that might be due to its structure being modeled off the late '50s SF short "Ms. Found in a Chinese Fortune Cookie" (which is utterly brilliant and original!) by C. M. Kornbluth. Unfortunately, even with her best ideas the reading is just so tedious.

[Grace Miller · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely phenomenal collection. Digs at the parts of the mind that lean into science, sociology, psychology. Makes you question what is really so human about any of those concepts. After an incredibly strong eponymous opener, standouts for me included “Mazes”, “The Direction of the Road”, “Vaster Than Empires and More Slow”, “Winter Downs”, “Horse Camp” and “Schrodinger’s Cat”. All this through deceivingly simplistic, appreciative prose with attentive variations on the concept of perspective. My first self-minded venture with Le Guin’s work and certainly won’t be the last. Just naturally beautiful.

[Molsa Roja(s) · Rating 5 out of 5]

an extraordinary -in all its meanings- book, from the beginning to the end. Buffalo gals is easy, terrible, beautiful and most of all, full of imagination. Loved it. I liked very much The white donkey too, a pain in my heart. The labrinth, of course. Oh, and May's lion, what a story. Of course, The Acacia Seeds Author too, what could I add? This short story about therolinguistics is nowadays a philosophic statement -one that I work within. Finally, She Unnames Them, a short yet powerful parable. Oh, I love Ursula.

[Ryan Smout · Rating 4 out of 5]

Surprisingly good, but I went in with low expectations. I loved some stories (the titular tale; "the direction of the road"). Others were just okay. One of my favorite features of this book was that LeGuin always explained what she was trying to accomplish with each story/poem right before she told it to you. Even when the stories didn't resonate with me, her ideas almost always did.

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ursula K. Le Guin turns perspective on its head in these short stories. Each are from a new and surprising perspective and the poetry is just as surprising and wonderful. Great book of short stories. I need to read her Hainish Cycles books now.

[Jay Raffo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most of the stories were excellent, but I hated the title one (Buffalo Gals). I'm not sure exactly what I disliked about it, but it just seemed kind of weird to me. It's probably just a matter of personal preference.
My favorites were "Mazes" (about a rat-like alien being experimented on), "Vaster Than Empires and More Slow" (about explorers on a planet with shared-consciousness plants), and "The Author of the Acacia Seeds" (about animal languages). They were beautifully written and emotional and wonderful. The poems were amazing as well. If it wasn't for Buffalo Gals, this would be 5 stars for sure.

[Ryan · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's not something you need to go out of your way to read unless you are a Le Guin superfan or are interested in her poetry (the whole book isn't poetry but there are a fair bit in here).

It's good enough I just really doubt any of the stories or poems will stick with me

[Rachael · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars. Favourite story was Vaster Than Empires and More Slow.

[Maranda Cromwell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Only knocked off a star for being too short! A nice book overall

[Yochi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Buffalo Gals was great! I may need to make an abridged version, simply removing the coyote incest, so I can read it to my son.