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Being a Beast: Adventures Across the Species Divide

Charles Foster (Goodreads Author)

3.24 · Rating details · 1,211 ratings · 253 reviews

Charles Foster set out to know the ultimate other: the non-humans, the beasts. And to do that, he tried to be like them, choosing a badger, an otter, a fox, a deer, and a swift. He lived alongside badgers for weeks, sleeping in a sett in a Welsh hillside and eating earthworms, learning to sense the landscape through his nose rather than his eyes. He caught fish in his teet ...more

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Hardcover, 256 pages

Published June 21st 2016 by Metropolitan Books (first published January 28th 2016)

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· 1,211 ratings · 253 reviews

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Jul 08, 2016 Jess Sohn rated it did not like it

Oh, how I really hated this. It was difficult to accept any "naturalist" observations from a person who makes no attempt to hide his contempt for so many animals in the kingdom. He also doesn't have any respect for the natural environment and minimizing his presence while out and doing his "experiments", which were basically comprised of rolling around on the ground, being a disturbance, and pooping everywhere. I didn't find his antics charming or informative; I found him to be an annoying, disr ...more

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Oct 23, 2016 Peter Boyle rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: nature, non-fiction

"I want to know what it is like to be a wild thing."

Foster

This book is bonkers. Charles Foster, a veterinarian and barrister among other occupations, explains his frustration with traditional nature writing, saying that it has "generally been about humans striding colonially around, describing what they see from six feet above the ground." So he decides to get down and dirty. He proceeds to experience the world as a badger, an otter, a fox, a red deer and a swift. Being a Beast is the chronicle of his madcap adventures.

And he doesn't do things by halves. In the book's longest chapter, his pal Burt digs out a chunk of a hill with a JCB. Foster and his young son Tom spend the six next weeks in this makeshift sett, living a badger's life. They venture out to eat worms and crawl through the forest undergrowth, sniffing vigorously as they go. In the Otter section Foster lies in a Devon river for hours at a time, trying to grab fish with his teeth. He mimics the urban fox by laying still in London parks and back gardens, and rifling through bins for leftover pizza.

Eccentric he may be, but this guy can really write. He describes badger setts as "tangled labyrinths which hollow out the hill so that it would ring like a bodhrán if one of the dark gods stamped." He tells of a moor that bleeds into a river: "A red earth cloud billows out like blood in a pub toilet after a fight." And I loved his account of a storm during the badger episode:

"Our sett was cradled in the interlocking fingers of tree roots: beech on either side, oak from above. The whole wood bent to the wind. There was no overground or underground: it was all just ground. We rocked in our cradle, the roots above us straining and creaking like the timbers of a rolling ship."

I have mixed feelings about the book overall. Foster veers off on too many tangents for my liking and I didn't enjoy his tendency to stray into shamanist territory. But his passion for animals and the wild is abundantly clear, and beautifully documented. If you're tired of conventional nature writing that is composed from the comfort of a desk or a camera lens, give this strange and beguiling book a try. ...more

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Jul 14, 2016 Holly rated it it was ok

Shelves: 2016-reads, audio

[New paragraph added to the end of my original review]

I never trusted this guy. Early on I was swept up in his language and his voice, and began to ask myself - Is this brilliant? Am I listening to a work of genius here? Because the audiobook was great on one level - Foster kind of sounds like Neil Gaiman, and I was tricked into thinking there might be profundity here. (I recently listened to countless hours of Gaiman's View From the Cheap Seats as he read about sci fi writers and graphic illust [New paragraph added to the end of my original review]

I never trusted this guy. Early on I was swept up in his language and his voice, and began to ask myself - Is this brilliant? Am I listening to a work of genius here? Because the audiobook was great on one level - Foster kind of sounds like Neil Gaiman, and I was tricked into thinking there might be profundity here. (I recently listened to countless hours of Gaiman's View From the Cheap Seats as he read about sci fi writers and graphic illustrators whom I couldn't care less about, because he reads everything as if it's a fairy tale and I'd fallen under his spell.)

But when I attended more closely to Foster's words, rather than his voice, I began to have serious doubts. I grew to dislike him intensely and become upset with the book and his insidious rhetoric that concealed his human-centered biases. He's not saying what it seems. He's making shit up just to be lofty (or beastly). His project is ill-conceived. He's frequently revolting, just to be gross. His stories of hunting were so disturbing I had to fast-forward. And what's with all the shaman crap? (Not that shamanism is crap but that he was probably misusing it.) His contempt for some animals was shocking (in light of his project): He thinks that otters are just nasty little "furry worms" - and he states that even before trying to "be" an otter. And CATS. Not only does he hate domestic cats, he wishes other predators would exterminate them, and he describes a scene in which he chases and torments a cat! (The cat kind of wins, though.) He's being human through and through, not a fox or whatever the hell he was pretending to be. He says he's trying not to anthropomorphize, but he cannot truly extinguish his human senses, not to mention his neocortex or bad sense of humor.

------------
I don't know why I didn't think of Thomas Nagel while reading this, but it took Chuck Klosterman to remind me of Nagel's important essay "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?" Here is CK's précis of Nagel's argument:

Nagel asks if it's possible for people to conceive what it's like to be a bat, and his conclusion is that it (probably) is not; we can only conceive what it would be like to be a human who was a bat. For example, bats use echolocation sonar to know what's in front of them. It's not difficult to imagine humans having echolocation sonar and how that would help us walk through a pitch-black room. That experience can be visualized. But what we can't understand is how that experience informs the consciousness of a bat. We can't even assess what level of consciousness a bat possesses, since the only available barometer for "consciousness" is our own. The interior life of a bat (or an octopus, or any nonhuman creature) is beyond our capacity [Italics mine].

This speaks to what I meant when I said I thought Foster's project was ill-conceived. By mimicking the mechanics of a badger or a swift (burrowing or flying) he thinks he can know what they think. He guesses at what they feel (sentience) but he cannot answer the consciousness question.

I'm glad that human beings are finally admitting that we don't/can't know everything about the consciousness of other life forms, and the questions have been asked by philosophers for centuries, for all time. The science is getting interesting, but logic tells me there will always be that gulf. (Maybe shamanism can cross it, but that's not science, and Foster 's book was messy conflation of the two.) I assume (and hope) that the answer to Frans de Waal's question, Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?, is no. ...more

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Jan 13, 2017 Callum McLaughlin rated it did not like it

Shelves: non-fiction, nature

I almost never DNF a book, and if I did I normally wouldn't want to rate it because I would think it unfair, but having suffered through 100 pages of this, and found so much of it verging on offensive, I just can't help myself.

Perhaps it was a mistake for me to even pick this up, since the concept alone had my eyes ready to roll, but it was such a strange and intriguing notion that I had to give it a go. Alas, my back was up from the very opening when he professed to having been a boastful troph I almost never DNF a book, and if I did I normally wouldn't want to rate it because I would think it unfair, but having suffered through 100 pages of this, and found so much of it verging on offensive, I just can't help myself.

Perhaps it was a mistake for me to even pick this up, since the concept alone had my eyes ready to roll, but it was such a strange and intriguing notion that I had to give it a go. Alas, my back was up from the very opening when he professed to having been a boastful trophy hunter and contributor to a hunting magazine for many years. So began a slippery slope that proved every one of my fears about this book to be true.

I'm sorry to break it to Foster, but you can't possibly understand what it's like to be a badger just because you've eaten worms and lived in a hole for a while (especially when you dug it using a JCB). It was downright laughable when he tried to excuse accepting the likes of fish pie, lasagne and chorizo from a friend whilst 'living wild' because badgers are 'opportunistic' animals that wouldn’t turn down a free meal...

Propping a badger's skull on a stick for no good reason and filling his home with taxidermy doesn't exactly convince me that he's learned compassion for animals, and the fact that he dragged his eight-year-old son into this madness was also somewhat disturbing. I was infuriated when he himself more or less said the boy was starting to become slightly feral by the end and didn't stop sneezing blood for a week because he inhaled so much dust whilst living underground.

When the section on otters opened with him unashamedly saying he doesn't even like them, before having his children defecate outside and hold a sniffing contest to compare faeces, I had to call it a day with this lunacy. It reeks (if you'll pardon the pun) of someone who is desperate to prove how 'quirky' they are, relying on ridiculous shock-factor behaviour to draw people in.

I'm all for the concept of learning more about other species so that we may better understand human beings, but this is pretentious waffle dressed up with frilly writing to fool us into thinking that's what it's about. Watch any documentary that David Attenborough has made throughout his career and not only will it be far more interesting, enlightening, factual and entertaining, but it will teach you a heck of a lot more about understanding and empathising with animals than this ever will. In fact, go and read one of the Beatrix Potter books he so clearly demonises as well; they have 100x more heart, not to mention a far greater amount of respect for animals in them than this book.

*And breathe*
...more

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Jul 17, 2016 Carlos rated it did not like it

If you love philosophy or mysticism related to animals , please disregard my review. I'm sorry but this book left me completely disappointed and made me feel like I wasted my time. I got this book because I though it would be filled with scientific research helped along by the method of cohabitation with the animals that were being explored by the author , but what I got was a write who thinks too highly of himself spouting cheap philosophical musings that have little to do with animals , mixed ...more

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Jan 30, 2016 Paul rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: books-read-2016, wainwright-prize, baillie-gifford-prize, natural-history

Have you ever wondered just what it would be like to be an eagle soaring on thermals or a stag surveying your territory? Some of us may have whilst walking in the countryside or over a contemplative drink, but Charles Foster wanted to know what it was like. Really, really wanted to know… So he chose five different animals; swift, deer, fox, otter and badger, and would try to live their lives as best he could.

He spent six weeks with his son living as a badger inside a hill in Wales in a sett that Have you ever wondered just what it would be like to be an eagle soaring on thermals or a stag surveying your territory? Some of us may have whilst walking in the countryside or over a contemplative drink, but Charles Foster wanted to know what it was like. Really, really wanted to know… So he chose five different animals; swift, deer, fox, otter and badger, and would try to live their lives as best he could.

He spent six weeks with his son living as a badger inside a hill in Wales in a sett that a friend of his with a JCB had excavated. His friend would leave meals for them to scavenge; but they went for it, eating earthworms and other things that the forest provided, trying to move around on all fours to get a badger’s eye view of the woods they were in. Trying to mimic what an otter does, meant that he spent quite a while splashing around in rivers failing to catch fish, and leaving his own spraints along the banks. Living as an urban fox was easier, sleeping rough in back gardens and scavenging for food in bins, but it did nearly get him arrested! He spends time deep in woods being a deer, imagining what it would be like to be tracked by hounds. Becoming a swift was possibly the hardest, as flying unaided has evaded humans., but he did have a go with a parachute to get a feel of the wind in his hair, and the flies in his teeth.

The human view of the world has some parallels to these creatures; we share the same senses; sight, smell, taste and sound, but their adaption has made them specialists in very particular ways, enhancing their senses so that they survive and thrive. This book is very different to the usual ones that you will read on wildlife. By making the effort to see things from the animal point of view, he has given us a very, very different perspective on the natural world. That and he is a little bit mad… But it works; drawing on neuroscience and psychology his efforts to emulate the lives of the five animals, give him an insight to their daily struggle for survival. There are some amusing moments, and there were parts that I found revolting; but it was refreshing to read something with a very different perspective to the usual natural history books. 3.5 stars overall. ...more

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Apr 24, 2016 Kaitlin added it · review of another edition

DNF-ing this as it just felt really pretentious to me and I wasn't feeling like I wanted to read it or as if I would actually get anything from it. Oh well. ...more

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May 26, 2016 Ben Thurley rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favourites

This book – and I hesitate to box it in with so insipid-sounding a genre as nature writing is crazy beautiful. A stunning, vertiginous, odd, outrageous, academically rich, and personally challenging work.

Charles Foster – a vet and academic –takes us on a mind-altering, shamanistic, trip into the wild as he sets out to discover (as far as the limits of the human mind and body will allow) what it is to be a badger, an otter, a fox, a red deer, and a swift.

Foster packs his analytical toolbox with ...more

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Jan 24, 2016 Josh rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

I really wanted to like this. I appreciated the idea of trying to "be a beast" by living and behaving as particular animals do. But it just didn't work out.

The opening is promising, the badger chapter. Charles lives in a badger sett and crawls around on all fours and tries to orient himself mostly by smell. He eats worms. He muses on the nature and relationships of badgers to their environment in a
philosophical way.

Unfortunately it's all downhill from there. The literal "being a beast" experim ...more

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Jan 14, 2021 Georgia rated it liked it · review of another edition

quite a hard one to rate - how do you begin to judge a man who chose to live as a badger, eating worms and snuffling around in the soil, apart from simply being surprised that someone agreed to sleep with him? the premise of the book is on one hand beautiful but on the other, fatally flawed - the answer to the question of knowing what it's like to experience the world as another animal being: 'you can't'. however, he probably would have got closer if he didn't have his mate on speed dial bringin ...more

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Aug 18, 2016 Kerri Anne rated it it was ok

Shelves: running-with-the-wolves, true-stories, not-so-recommended

This is undoubtedly one of the strangest literary journeys on which I've ever embarked, and after finishing this book, I'm left feeling both strangely inspired* and noticeably annoyed. There are parts of this book I wholly disagree with, based on my own knowledge of the wild animals in question, and based on my own experiences with them. (E.g. Foster's chapter on otters seems wholly misinformed, short-sighted, small in scope, and wholly misrepresentation of otters as a whole. He's dealing with a This is undoubtedly one of the strangest literary journeys on which I've ever embarked, and after finishing this book, I'm left feeling both strangely inspired* and noticeably annoyed. There are parts of this book I wholly disagree with, based on my own knowledge of the wild animals in question, and based on my own experiences with them. (E.g. Foster's chapter on otters seems wholly misinformed, short-sighted, small in scope, and wholly misrepresentation of otters as a whole. He's dealing with a very specific river otter in a very specific region of the world, and his "truths" about them should be taken with a vat of salt. I've seen otters play, exhibit wit and cunning, and be altogether amusing and ingenious creatures.) There are parts of this book that are beautiful and interesting, and I particularly enjoyed the chapters on foxes and swifts, though I'm left thinking that's due in large part to particularly enjoying foxes and swifts in general, and not necessarily due to any true gift of Foster's.

There are also far too many parts of this book that feel wholly doused in upper-middle-class white privilege (e.g. sleeping on private property while appearing both homeless and slightly crazed, and having a conversation with a police officer wherein the author feels safe enough to be a sarcastic smart-ass, and wherein if that had been a minority person, or even someone of lesser class status - especially in the U.S. - they would have been arrested, or worse). One could argue the entire premise of this book is the product of upper-middle-class white privilege/disenchantment/ennui. And that's pretty gross.

I don't like the pretentious, WASPy parts of the book at all (and oh, there are many). I don't like the part of the book where, in his attempt to be more like x, y, z wild animal, the author himself engages and instructs his children to engage in unsustainable, detrimental, and altogether poor outdoor/wilderness ethics (e.g. instructing his children to take literal shits next to a flowing, functioning river). Foster either seemingly doesn't understand Leave No Trace, and/or doesn't care/doesn't think it applies to him and his mighty journey into the great unknown of becoming a beast. I happen to care a great deal about people traipsing out into the natural world and being completely idiotic about the type of footprints they leave and the type of long-term damage they could do.

I also don't for a second believe love has to be reciprocal to be felt, especially when it come to wilderness, and wild animals. (Which is the final, strange premise with which Foster closes this book). Parents can love an unborn child for a great deal of time before that child can even think about loving them back. Humans all over the globe can love other people that don't love them back, not yet and not ever. I can love each and every fox I see, and I do - my heart verily skips each time, and I feel an instant and intense sense of kinship and adoration for them - while completely understanding foxes, both individually and collectively, care nothing for me, and nor should they, save for taking care to steer clear of humans (sometimes driving vehicles) like me who might do irreparable damage to them, either accidentally or wholly intentionally.

The one piece of Foster's book (and his misguided but potentially well-intentioned process in writing it) that stands true and valid to me: There is a worth in seeking to see parts of this world from other vantages, no matter how literal and bizarre, in seeking to view our natural and contrived worlds via altogether "other" points of view. He did that. I just don't think he was altogether too successful. And maybe that's the entire point. Maybe some points of view just exist outside of our tangible purview, and that's more than okay: it's necessary.

*Inspired to tell better stories, to do better by our wild creatures, and to learn much more about foxes, swifts, otters, badgers, and all the rest.

[Two stars for foxes and for swifts, and for thinking outside the box, however misguided, pretentious, and WASPy the thinking may have been.] ...more

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Jun 20, 2016 Sarah Ames-Foley rated it it was ok

Shelves: non-fiction

I wouldn't dissuade others from reading this book, but I wouldn't recommend it either. I wasn't sure what I expected from a book detailing a man's efforts to live like animals, but I found this to be a rather underwhelming read. The writing itself was respectable, but I just didn't get sucked into the material like I'd like to. I was constantly rolling my eyes and waiting for the book to end. Foster is constantly using odd metaphors to describe his experiences, and I sort of get lost in figuring ...more

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Mar 19, 2019 Anna rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Nope. Nope nope nope nope nope.

I wanna punch author in his face for writing that people suffering from depression are so selfish in focusing on themselves that they lack empathy for others. And I am writing this review in English so that more people can see how disgusted I am.

Good side of this book is the language, Polish translation is quite smooth and easy to read. But if we are talking about its core, what's inside, new informations: there is none. I don"t trust any word printed between these ...more

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Jan 19, 2017 Tom Ewing rated it really liked it · review of another edition

A collection of experiments in radical empathy with animals - or roaming around the English countryside and cityscape pretending to be them, take your pick - the writing this reminds me most of is Julian Cope's stuff on Krautrock and prehistory. Like Cope, Foster is a scholar, a mystic, a sensualist, a troll, and a genuine, gleeful seeker after knowledge, which often turns out to be self-knowledge. Also like Cope, the guy is a swaggering, rich writer. And - a final point of comparison - he can l ...more

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Mar 27, 2017 Yukari Watanabe rated it it was ok

I couldn't get into it. It was like listening to a harmless but boring uncle chatting to himself at a dinner table. ...more

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Feb 14, 2017 Olly L-J rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: environment-nature, owned

3.5
'You've got to get dirty in the earth, cold and fearful in the air, singed in the fire and seasick in the water. You've got to scratch, scratch, scratch the world with the same paw or wing movements as the creatures you long to know.'

How much can we truly know about animals and the natural world by observing them from a distance, or studying them in a lab? Charles Foster believes, and I'm inclined to agree, that to really get to know animals we have to live like them, see the world through th 3.5
'You've got to get dirty in the earth, cold and fearful in the air, singed in the fire and seasick in the water. You've got to scratch, scratch, scratch the world with the same paw or wing movements as the creatures you long to know.'

How much can we truly know about animals and the natural world by observing them from a distance, or studying them in a lab? Charles Foster believes, and I'm inclined to agree, that to really get to know animals we have to live like them, see the world through their eyes - instead of viewing the world from 6 feet, try 6 inches.

This is nature writing with a twist, and Charles Foster is as eccentric as they come. He lives for 6 weeks, with his 8-year-old son, in the hillsides of Wales eating worms and experiencing life as a Badger would. He rummages through bins, as a fox, in the east end of London. And he is chased by a bloodhound through the Somerset hills, experiencing the same fear and adrenaline as a red deer might.

Of course, we can never truly live as an animal, or know how or what they think or feel. Yet, this book is probably as close as they come. Foster is clearly highly intelligent, and this comes across in some beautiful descriptive passages. However, it also does mean he tends to veer off topic which made this book slightly less readable as it could have been.

My favourite chapter was about swifts, interestingly the animal he really couldn't experience. But maybe this is what makes it so great. Robert Macfarlane puts this far more succinctly and elegantly than i ever could:

“Wild animals, like wild places, are invaluable to us precisely because they are not us. They are uncompromisingly different. The paths they follow, the impulses that guide them, are of other orders. The seal's holding gaze, before it flukes to push another tunnel through the sea, the hare's run, the hawk's high gyres : such things are wild. Seeing them, you are made briefly aware of a world at work around and beside our own, a world operating in patterns and purposes that you do not share. These are creatures, you realise that live by voices inaudible to you.”

Or maybe I just love swifts ... ...more

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May 28, 2017 David Ball rated it did not like it · review of another edition

I wanted to like this. My wife worked in the same London chambers as Foster, and I'm sure I must have met him once or twice over drinks, so I felt I should support him, however indirect my connection. I also remember seeing a positive review for it in the Economist, which I tend to trust. Plus the premise for the book is pretty original - barmy English barrister attempts to live like a wild animal - what's not to like? I guess my main problem was that of expectations. I thought for each foray in ...more

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Sep 14, 2016 Zak rated it it was amazing

Recommends it for: People who love philosophy, nature, and quirky authors

The premise of Being a Beast is as misleading as it is wacky: a man tries to live as a badger, then as an otter, a fox, a deer, and a swift, in order to understand what it’s like to experience the world as a wild animal. But beneath the surface this series of philosophical essays represents nature writing of the highest order: probing, intellectual, alert, funny, and astonishing.

Charles Foster is an Oxford fellow and self-described “writer, traveller, veterinarian and barrister.” His publication ...more

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Jan 01, 2018 Mary Keen rated it it was amazing

Shelves: audio-overdrive

It's a very unusual book that I wouldn’t recommend to everyone, but actually have recommended it to 5 friends. In fact, I'm now listening to it for the 2nd time, which I've never done before!

The author, Charles Foster is a strange, curious Englishman who tried to get into the mind and habits of a badger, then an otter and others –by totally living in their environments and developing their senses, which he partially seemed able to. He talks frankly about his personal transition from internationa ...more

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Jul 20, 2016 Cheryl rated it it was ok

I was very intrigued to check out this book when I read the concept of it. I mean this is dedication when an author goes all out to really submerse himself into the subject matters that he is writing about. I don't doubt for one bit that Mr. Foster really did eat a warm or drinking double espressos every couple of hours to attempt to experience what it is like to be an otter. As Mr. Foster states being a otter is like being on speed.

I contemplated giving up on this book after reading just about ...more

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Feb 22, 2016 Julia rated it really liked it · review of another edition

'Born again' naturalist (he used to be a hunting, shooting barrister) Charles Foster enrols his family in a quest to get a closer understanding of what it's really like to be various animals by adopting their lifestyles. It sounds crazy, it is crazy - but the book is amusing and enlightening because Foster is quite well aware of that and writes in an enthusiastic but witty way about his experiences.

It made me wish that my own dear children were young again so I could make them come out with me ...more

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Aug 06, 2016 Rob Adey rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Enormously entertaining account of extreme field biology, told with humour, self-awareness and gusto. There's probably too much reliance on evo-psych, and in the last chapter Foster reveals himself to be a fan of Rupert Sheldrake, but there's still a wealth of amazing info on his subjects here, and I really admire his dedication in attempting to get under the skin on these animals. Fun, too, if you imaging him reading it to a furry convention. ...more

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Nov 17, 2016 Leila Nicotera rated it it was ok

Shelves: 2016

A bit disappointed with the amount of poetic introspection about himself more than anything. I expected and hoped for something a little more raw and visceral. Moments of thought provoking insights, but overall disappointing.

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May 09, 2018 Alice rated it it was amazing

Shelves: green

Charles Foster is an intriguing man. He holds a PhD in law/bioethics from the University of Cambridge and teaches Medical Law and Ethics at the University of Oxford. He is a qualified veterinary surgeon, a practicing lawyer, and author of over a dozen books, with titles ranging from Elements of Medical Law to Wired for God? The Biology of Spiritual Experience. He has also written about searching for the Ark of the Covenant and the legality of medical mistakes. He’s an adventurer of a stripe we d ...more

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May 23, 2017 Ben rated it liked it · review of another edition

A bit weird, but refreshing

Foster really has pushed some boundaries with this witty book, based on a really cool idea. Basically, this book is an account of a slightly odd journey Foster takes to becoming a number of different animals. He recollects and muses about times he lived as a number of animals for extended periods of time, trying to experience the world as they do. We hear about how he created a badger den and lived in it with his son, about living as an urban fox in London (getting int ...more

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Sep 17, 2016 Caroline Kelemen rated it it was ok

Shelves: only-listened-to, wobble, european-authors, environmental

This is such a weird book and not in a good way. Please don't tell your kids to shit right next to rivers. Just because it's ok for beavers doesn't mean it's ok for you. ...more

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Aug 01, 2018 Fox rated it it was ok

Shelves: non-fiction, i-like-animals, library, memoir, philosophy, science, 2018

Don't take the two star rating to mean this was not a good book. I found the book extremely interesting, and learned a decent amount from it. The rating comes more from my constant puzzling over whether or not living in a hole in the ground, eating earthworms, aphids, and larvae, etc. is truly necessary to embody the mind of an animal. Along with this is my concern with the notion that you don't need to lose yourself in order to become an animal shamanistically speaking. Isn't a certain degree o Don't take the two star rating to mean this was not a good book. I found the book extremely interesting, and learned a decent amount from it. The rating comes more from my constant puzzling over whether or not living in a hole in the ground, eating earthworms, aphids, and larvae, etc. is truly necessary to embody the mind of an animal. Along with this is my concern with the notion that you don't need to lose yourself in order to become an animal shamanistically speaking. Isn't a certain degree or dissolution of self necessary to truly embody the other? You give up yourself for a new experience - isn't anything less than that a bit problematic? I don't think The Peregrine or H is For Hawk should be viewed as 'lesser than' for the grief encountered within, but rather on equal footing or moreso to this author's experience. Same for Peregrine Spring. Everyone lost something, but gained much more from the experience. Such is life.

This book is full of interesting ideas about the animal experience, more philosophy than much else. The bibliography in the back was great and pretty much all of the books are now on my to-read as a result. I just couldn't help but want more from what was written in here - why wasn't every chapter as long as the badger one and as well thought? I felt the question of prey vs. predator, and in particular the section on swifts, deserved more attention. And why choose an otter if you resent them so much? Why not attempt to better understand, or choose another creature?

This book felt incomplete to me. At the end there wasn't as much offer of how one can help the animals or better empathize with them. It was just a singular experience with little hint as to how you can incorporate the understanding gained to better the environment or one's own life. I don't think everyone needs to defecate on the ground to mark territory to get into the mindspace of another creature, nor do they need to eat grass to empathize.

It's a very strange book, indeed, but that doesn't make it a bad one. ...more

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Apr 25, 2018 Spencer rated it it was amazing

I loved this book. About my only complaint, for much of it, was how he never referenced or even mentioned John Muir who was very much an experiential/scientific engager with nature. Very much a kindred spirit. But, I guess Muir's more popular this side of the pond.

Regardless of that, it was a fun, delightful, and engaging experiment with approaching the lives and experiences of animals. I see so many reviews on here who rate him poorly because... well, I don't even remember why, but I totally di ...more

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Apr 15, 2017 Colin rated it really liked it

I liked this a lot. The writer seems a bit erm... eccentric. Having hunted animals in his younger days, he feels himself part of the natural order and now, in a more ethical mode, he sets out to see the world through their eyes, or rather through their noses. In the process he rummaged through bins (as a fox) waits in cold river water (otter) and spends weeks with his son, living in a hole in the ground, eating earthworms and roadkill. It's all the sort of thing that would get most people sectio ...more

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Mar 14, 2018 Nat rated it did not like it

Shelves: did-not-enjoy, problematic

I made it 77 pages into this book before calling it a day. What started off as the poetic musings of a 'naturalist' turned into what I can only describe as an absolute sh*tshow.
To begin with, laying in a ditch eating fish pie does not equal a 'badgers experience' and I found the writers descriptions of how frantically a live worm tried to escape his mouth both grotesque and totally not what I expected from this book.
Then we come onto his 'experience' as an otter. To start off his messed up exp ...more

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About Charles Foster

Charles Foster

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Charles Foster is a Fellow of Green Templeton College at the University of Oxford. He is a qualified veterinarian, teaches medical law and ethics, and is a practicing barrister. Much of his life has been spent on expeditions: he has run a 150-mile race in the Sahara, skied to the North Pole, and suffered injuries in many desolate and beautiful landscapes. He has written on travel, evolutionary bio ...more