Animal Planet

by Scott Bradfield

On Animal Planet, animals possess the ability to talk as well as any human. They rebel against their human keepers, breaking out of zoos and leaving homes to live as independent beings. For most animals, however, freedom means working a steady job (usually for human bosses) and enjoying the comforts and complacencies of human life.
Into this mix flies Charlie the Crow, rabble-rouser and avian revolutionary, whose mission it is to wean animals from the bottle of contemporary culture. But the animals find that freedom depends on who's defining it, and Charlie becomes a media celebrity - appearing on talk shows to promote books, movies, and other endorsement opportunities. As the revolution is co-opted by savvy profiteers, like the marketing maven Bunny Fairchild, Charlie goes underground, traveling with his reluctant pal Buster the Penguin (who longs for his domestic life back in Antarctica), pursued by an assortment of animal activists, CIA and military operatives, reporters, movie moguls, publishers, and others. Everyone wants a piece of Charlie's radical action...even if they have to kill him to get it.

Genres: Fiction

231 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1995

About the author

Scott Michael Bradfield is an American essayist, critic and fiction writer who resides in London, England.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_B...

Reviews

[Larry Carr · Rating 5 out of 5]

Animal Planet by Scott Bradfield is not a book I would normally read. I am not unfriendly to animals, but am not overly attracted to the animation of animals, albeit I enjoyed the many cartoons of Warner Bros. Disney et al, over the years. I am also a loyal fan and subscriber to Scott Bradfield’s YouTube series reading great books in the bathtub 🛁, aka pointless adventures in literature… and also I have greatly enjoyed reading Scott’s relatively unknown works of fiction-a couple of my favorites come to mind: 3 paragraphs of Bob Johnson and the Planet of Bold Women. I happen to have possession of the Animal Planet in my kindle (sorry Scott). Most likely would have never read it -except for RGBIB462 https://youtu.be/6uwc4E9vTRc?si=ir904... -a recent YouTube bathtub 🛁 episode where Scott discussed Animal Planet, his 3rd novel -written in the early 90’s, a time where, as Scott describes it -you couldn’t tell the difference between a Republican & a Democrat, the commies were now part of the global economy, and the game was monetization, capitalization and marketing of anything and everything… hence why not try the animal world. Scott advised us of his plan to read Animal Planet, in future bathtub episodes. So I decided to put my reading biases aside and read it. The book triggered unexpectedly, a most positive & enthusiastic reading, resulting in a 5 star rating. Perhaps star inflated, but nonetheless a heart felt response to the book’s message. A book some view as satire. I rather consider it -a modern allegory to our plight -human/animal- encompassing our planet.

So let’s take a further look at the characters that inhabit Animal Plant, and what’s with the story?

“ As they grow old together in the same divided spaces, they begin looking forward to only two things–rain and sleep. Because both bring places to hide. Places animals can hide from themselves. Charlie the Crow went there to rest for a while. — Charlie just wanted to settle down somewhere. He wanted a place where he could cease moving, but never cease talking. Because Charlie loved to talk. It was one of his life’s few pleasures. — All across London Zoo, animals heard the words Charlie told them, but couldn’t believe those words were meant for them. —Winter Came Early-the animals began hearing the R words - Words like recession, redundancy and rationalization. -rumors of leveraged buyouts, corporate takeovers, asset stripping, privatization, the ECU, Princess Di ’ s mood swings, and the planet-wide biodiversity crisis.”

“0nly Scaramangus the Wildebeest managed to endure every emotional vicissitude —Scaramangus basked in the steam and the heat of his own magnificent presence. —“I am chosen” -From out of all the countless Wildebeests -human beings have chosen me to represent my species to the world.”

“Then, One Night -a radical-extemist guerrilla faction of Animal Action! blew the front gate off the zoo -“We all breathe the air! We all love the earth! Endangered species of the world-unite!” —Charlie could hardly contain himself. -Something was happening, he thought. -Across the zoo’s triangular, compartmentalization map, the animals were slowly awakening to one another. — To his amazement, Charlie saw a community of animals beginning to take shape. Ruminants, primates, rodents, carnivores, and marsupials. Wild ground squirrels and golden lion tamarinds, meerkats and mongooses, fennec foxes and old spotted pigs. enough?” —Charlie’s strangely familiar voice sent a hush over the crowd. For the first time in their lives, the animals realized— Someone was speaking to them. —You either make sense of your lives, or somebody else makes sense of them for you. And where does that leave you, my fellow beasties? I’ll tell you where that leaves you. Right back where you came from. Sitting in cages, man. Pissing on your own doorsteps.” — It’s malevolent, genocidal, terra-phobic, right-brain-thinking human aggression–that’s what it is! And have we had enough? I’m asking you guys? Have we had enough?” —Who’s sick of being lied to? Who’s ready to take control of their lives?” — “Us!” the animals roared. “Us, us, us, us, us!” —Not us, Scaramangus thought to himself. Not us, but them.”

The Superintendent— “We want to improve your standard of living, but at the same time we’ve got to be fiscally responsible. We’re working on a lot of new ideas right now, but we’ll need your help to implement them.” Charlie “For example” -“Well, market forces. We open up the zoo to what they call Free Enterprise Zones. We farm you out to extracurricular jobs–serving tea for the handicapped, fetching groceries and newspapers, or a little rudimentary shop and construction work. — to improve your lives through hard work and competigive negotiation.” Charlie “Yeah, right. -Look, buster, do you really think we’ll fall for this bogus ‘market forces’ folderol?” Superintendent-there are others in my department who aren’t so sympathetic to public insurrection.”

“From That Point on, — ANIMAL RIGHTS NOW! FREE THE SERENGHETI SEVEN! EAT THE RICH BEFORE THEY EAT YOU! — THEY CAME IN the late afternoon, — The wet plop of teargas canisters drew arcs of smoke across the blue sky, and snipers fired hypodarts from elevated cranes and rooftops. — FOR SCARAMANGUS, THE line between himself and other animals vanished, threatening to take him with it. The chaos of bodies, the random brutality and anguish, the feverish clash of animals and men. — Every day the wind blew scraps of morning newspaper into their cages, and the animals perused them for articles about their brief fling with greatness. But the newspapers mentioned only shifting interest rates, Third World death squads, American tobacco exports to Thailand. — Charlie -“Trick is -you can’t cage an entire nation. You can only cage individual animals, one or two at a time. Ergo, a competitive economy. Animal versus animal, male versus female, the have-somes versus the have-nones. Don’t let them fool you with their bullshit about economic retrenchment, -What’s being retrenched is us.”

Polar Latitude. “The First Time Buster heard anything about the London Zoo Rebellion -scanning the knobby serrated dial for anything from the BBC World Service. —A violent rebellion. —Even Sandy was drawn by the voice on the radio “What’s a lion, Buster? What’s a Tiger? -what’s a human being?—BUSTER ENJOYED DREAMING about strange places, but beyond that he didn’t like to get too involved. Which was probably why he was such good friends with his polar opposite, Whistling Pete, a middle-aged penguin who didn’t dream so much as act. And who subsequently got himself carnally involved with just about every cute penguinette he could lay his flippers on.” Time passes then — “THE FOLLOWING MORNING the troops arrived like a benediction. White, seamed parachutes blossomed, and the storm paratroopers landed running, disengaging themselves from their deflating nylon envelopes with adroit little tugs and zips, pulling pistols from their holsters and releasing well-trained battle cries into the gray air. — “ It’s not fair to blame it all on testosterone,” a voice told Buster from out of nowhere. “Because it’s not men against women, you know, or even human beings against animals. It’s animals against animals, and that’s the scary part. It’s animals against themselves, trying to conquer the deepest assumptions of their own bodies.” — Buster turned The large black crow was perched on a leaning iron pole. “What’s a black crow like you doing at the South Pole?” Charlie. “What do you think I’m doing? -freezing my pimply little butt off, that’s what.”

MANIFEST DESTINY “Human beings have invaded the western rim and they’re headed this way,” “They’ve got tanks, barbed wire, electrified fences, history books, foreign trade secretaries, corporate spokespersons, and a lot of dumb, well-intentioned military grunts just looking for adventure and a good time.” —Buster turned The”If we want to warn everybody the humans are coming, then why’re we heading off where there’s nobody around to warn?” Charlie. “I’m an animal-rights activist, committed to furthering the cause of my animal brethren— I also really need to be alone.”

“Muk Luk pined and fretted away her days in a Welfare subsidized igloo. —The only Eskimo of her tribe to be relocated to the South Pole byAmerica’s Federal Housing Program. —Rick the Husky wagged his ever-optimistic tail and grinned. “Company’s coming -What do you think of the chances, Muk Luk? You might even get laid.” —“Lieutenant Jack Hollister, ma’am -Navy Intelligence. And this is my Soviet liaison, Sergeant Yuri Rudityev.” —“You ever see this joker around? We think maybe he’s traveling in the company of a small black-and-white penguin.” Muk Luk - “Stranger to me.” —Muk Luk had already decided. -driving Rick the Husky across the spuming snow. - They were hurtling into the quickening future rather than dreading the inviolate past. —General Heatthclff didn’t even mind Antarctica that much. “Do you have any idea how much more important the quality of life is than the quantity?” Hollister. “My thoughts exactly.” The General -“ despite the remarkable progress we’ve made in the world of international diplomacy lately, there are still some pretty sneaky, evil creatures running around. Creatures who talk too much. Creatures who think they know all the answers. Creatures with bad attitudes toward authority. Creatures who don’t believe in our free-market economy. I think you boys know precisely the sorts of creatures I’m talking about.” —Buster “I mean where will you go Charlie?” Charlie “I guess if I could be anywhere I wanted, I’d probably live in the country— Some place with seasons in it. -And I’d stay put. -I’ve done my share of traveling, Buster. -I intend to really settle down.” “Charlie? I mean, if I were to come and visit, would there be a place for me?” -“even a peripatetic penguin such as yourself, Buster, and you happen to find yourself in my neck of the woods? Well, you’d be goddamn welcome anytime of the year, no kidding. A place where everybody takes what they need and gives what they can afford. -refrigerator -freezers, packed with goodies- Häagen-Dazs, Buster. Corn dogs, chili con carne, Sarah Lee Pound Cake, all the Pringles you can eat.” — “Wouldn’t it be great, Charlie, if like there really was this worldwide animal revolution and all?” Buster was a leaner, hungrier version of himself, with firm haunches and a grizzly, unshaven face. He had learned there was just no telling how far a penguin could walk if he set his mind to it.” —“I don’t hear anything, Charlie.” “That” Charlie said. Thin. Unresonant. -Just a rhythm at first, Duh-duh-duh, - duh, duh, duh. ‘Ere We Go! - The voice boomed out -through a pair of enormous Blaupunkt loudspeakers — “But Charlie -What’s a helicopter looking for way out here?” “They’ve picked us up on infrared, -We’re going to have to run for it.” “We’ve got the little bastards now,” Hollister said. —“Up the hill and over!” Charlie shouted. “You can do it, Buster!” The bullets were hitting the snow with muffled, splattery pops. Plup-pluppa-plup. — —Charlie -“When you’re running toward something you believe in, you’re running outside history itself. You’re running toward places only your mind can get to. Believe, Buster. Believe that a better world’s waiting for us on the other side of that hill!” Then. “It’s you,” Buster whispered- “I never thought it would be you.” She was standing on the brow of the hill -The biggest, ugliest, and most wonderful-looking female Eskimo anybody had ever seen in the entire history of the Animal Planet. —poised to hurl an enormous spear. -Then the spear was in the air. And Charlie watched. -a crack and a chatter and the spear penetrated the whirling rotors, pinning the entire helicopter to the blue sky like a butterfly specimen to a killing tray. “Muk Luk hate the military-industrial complex— Muk Luk wish they take all their stupid toys and go home. —a lumbering crack.nThere was a slow pause like an afterthought. Then, succinctly, it exploded.”

Animals Imagine. “Voices Were Carrying across the entire surface of the spinning Animal Planet. “Charlie got away. They sent Air Force fucking-One after the bastard, and he got away.” — THERE WERE TINY pocket rebellions in South Africa, Saint Petersburg, and Bengal. A few seaport towns were blockaded by seals, whales, and dolphins. A surly herd of beef initiated a protracted hunger strike in Texas. — The long arctic night was waning. And some animals, at least, were starting to wake up.” Humanity responds. “Your corporations are owned by the same guy who owns my corporations. And the guy who owns your corporations also owns a few hundred slaughterhouses and dairy farms. What you want me to do is put together a deal for a book that will make vague sweeping generalizations about animal rights but won’t get anybody into trouble with the men who pay their salaries. Am I close, Bart? Am I tuned to the right frequency, or is this just my migraine acting up again?” “-Bunny achieved a weird epiphany. Finally she understood. She didn’t feel so confused anymore. It was a different sort of clarity. The sort of clarity Bunny liked to keep to herself.” Bunny makes her pitch. - “This is bigger than animal rights, Charlie,” Bunny said out loud in the ringing office. “And I’m talking net, not gross.” —“But why let that ruin your life? There’s still a lot of beauty left, son. Take a walk down by the beach and you’ll see. Hold a baby crow in your arms, or feel the breeze in your wings, or take a long swig of a really cold root beer. Enjoy the moments, son, and let ugly old history take care of itself. Don’t wear yourself out trying to change the world; it just doesn’t work that way.”— Now that the battle for freedom is over, aren’t there any special words of wisdom you’d like to impart?” Charlie took a breath. He adjusted the microphone. “I was afraid something like this might happen,” Charlie said. — “Dustin Hoffman as you, Charlie. Gene Hackman as Buster the Penguin. Demi Moore as Muk Luk. And in my part–who else? I see Meryl Streep, don’t you, Charlie?”

Much, much later. Charlie on campus -His Takeaways- “You’re gonna spend your life being told how to read, which is a lot worse than being told what to read, believe you me, and I guess that’s about the only knowledge I’ve got to impart to you guys this afternoon.”

Then. “CHARLIE AND BUSTER were convicted of treason, flight from prosecution, extortion of public confidence, and displaying prematurely anti-authoritarian sentiments without the benefit of acceptable profit motivation. — their sentence was eventually commuted to life imprisonment after a last-minute mercy plea by their court-appointed legal representative, Dave the Otter. “Let’s face it, guys,” Dave told the legal boys upstairs. “You don’t like ’em, I don’t like ’em, but how would it look, frying some cute little penguin on public TV?” Then later pardoned.

A Connection. “When Nietzsche made such a big deal out of the eternal recurrence, I wonder if he was talking about popular culture,” Charlie wondered out loud. “By insisting on being always new, popular culture constantly ends up being nothing but eternally the same. Freedom is no longer a state of being, man. It’s now a high marketing concept.” —“After centuries of mindless, foolish, and economically unfeasible divisiveness, the world was finally coming together. Humans and animals alike just had to believe. —Charlie had lacked the fundamental psychodynamics that an act like flight required. Belief in oneself. Belief in one’s world. Belief in the abilities of language and body to carry a bird into dimensions it doesn’t know about. “I wasn’t walking to keep you company,” Charlie confessed that night after lights out. “I was walking because I couldn’t do any better. I guess I should’ve told you, but it’s a difficult thing to admit. That you’re a bird with wings, but you can’t fly.”

One Grassy Mountain. “Charlie began climbing it right away. “Sometimes anger’s enough,” he said, plodding steadily up the mossy path, kicking soda cans and candy wrappers out of his way like St. Patrick clearing Ireland of serpents. -So being righteously pissed of every so often may not always be good for your state of mind, but sometimes it wakes you up. It makes you do something besides sit around feeling sorry for yourself all day. -That’s what perspective means, I often think. Getting so far away from things you can’t see them clearly anymore.” — “Maybe it just means you’re looking at something bigger than the damage, Charlie. Maybe, when you get up high like this, you’re looking at the whole planet, and how incredible it is, and how vast and amazing it’ll always be.”

The author’s afterword. -“the London Zoo, and heard the voice of Scaramangus speak to me from one of the enclosures. The idea of an animal who was enamored of his significance as a highly-regarded inmate got me started — the voice of Charlie–a solitary rabble-rouser who couldn’t decide between saving his fellow animals, or abandoning them to their stupid complacency–that blessed me with the spontaneous joyful daily pleasure of developing my third novel over the next few years. — But if fiction gives me anything–as writer or reader–it is never a sense of advantage; rather it makes the real world around me even realer, and transforms the fictional possibilities we imagine for ourselves every day into one continuous remarkable space. — its closing chapters–which I consider to be some of the best fiction I have ever done. — And Hollywood did what Hollywood does best–it decided against a Disney adaptation of my novel because they thought it might make them look “anti-zoo” (I kid you not.) Ah, history. You couldn’t make it up.”

No you can’t, which is why I prefer fiction. And Bradfield does fiction well. Thanks, Scott! Looking forward to your Animal Planet readings in the bathtub 🛁… see you soon on YouTube.

[Meg · Rating 4 out of 5]

Social critique should always be this funny.

I would expect the book, with its focus on the media circus, to feel a little dated given when it was written, before the real internet boom. But somehow it doesn't. Its vision of hope is a little overly vague at the end, though - perhaps that's sensible enough, given its simultaneous critique of capitalism and revolution. Though that makes me curious to read more political satire written in a post Seattle '99, post Occupy moment, though, because some of the critique is going to be very different, and I wonder what the possibilities for change are that could be opened up by a strong satire of those movements.

[Roz Gibson · Rating 1 out of 5]

Excellent premise, terrible execution. I quit reading when I got to the line about the crow having to shave.

[Joyce · Rating 3 out of 5]

The animals can talk and want more freedom, but that means when they rebel, they will have to work at inane jobs and possibly begin to enjoy all the blessings and evils of humankind. Charlie the Crow leads the rebellion and a penguin named Buster joins him. They are pursued by some very incompetent human soldiers and eventually spend several years in jail. At their release, they separate and live out their lives as unknowns. I chose to read it quickly and to enjoy the story, but there are many social and cultural nuances that could be explored. Great writing with many play on words, references to the times which was 1995, but could be present time, and quirky characters both human animal.

[Darren · Rating 3 out of 5]

Engaging characters, and story well enough crafted, but I assume this was meant to be allegorical and I just didn't "get" what Bradfield was trying to go for at all - it just seemed a bit random/pointless.

[Jonathan Gruber · Rating 3 out of 5]

quite fun book about animals taking over the planet. Lots of fun turns and quirks, but also some misses and overall kind of forgettable

[James Marshall · Rating 4 out of 5]

Truly original novel about animals who talk and gain independence (of a sort). It's funny, well-written and topical, despite being written 30 years ago.

[Holly · Rating 2 out of 5]

The blurbs led me to believe I'd love this book: "passionate, daring book reminiscent of Orwell's Animal Farm" and "brilliant satire, propelled by a furious comic inventiveness somewhere between Carl Hiaasen and John Kennedy Toole" and "crucially sophisticated and timely rewriting of the nature of allegory...this is going to be a famous book". In fact this book is not well known. Bradfield's subject is so fun, so great, but it doesn't reach its goal. There are too many gaps; the reader cannot suspend disbelief.

Charlie the Crow loves to talk. He's seen the world, "overcrowded cities, polluted oceans, animal killing fields, corrupted body politics," and now he wants a place to hang out for a while, selecting the London Zoo, where the animals are in a bit of a stupor (Why, exactly, are they so complacent? Because, like Noah's arc, they are not part of a community of their own kind? Were they ever?). Charlie challenges them to think about their dreams. Naturally, there is an uprising; leaders like Charlie and Scaramangus the wildebeest (Mr. Big) are born.

In parallel, there are animal worlds where animals behave like humans - they have jobs and suburbs and participate in a capitalist society - and some are not happy about it, longing for adventure and freedom and less civilization. This is where my confusion begins - the penguins, for example, have not been acculturated by humans - they don't know from humans. Are we meant to believe the trappings of civilization are the same regardless of their genesis? That a civilization created by penguins has the same pitfalls as that created by humans? Our biologists tell us, in fact, that animal societies are very different than human ones.

Humans decide they need to "save" the animals from themselves, esp after the London Zoo incident. They want the animals to play by the rules of human society (pay taxes, have jobs, live in apartments, etc) - and this by default means that most animals will be lower class citizens, lacking education, opposable thumbs, etc. Charlie believes in the domino effect, which was used during the Cold War to describe how communism might spread. The humans fly into Antarctica with military aircraft and enforce human rules, in fact taking over the society that already existed b/c the penguins' society was already human-like. Like dominos, other animal societies fall into the same traps. The animals know, or come to know, that this isn't what they want, but because they were only recently awakened, they only know what they don't want, not what they want. The animals are split into a couple of factions, one behind Charlie and another behind Mr. Big. They are splintered and disorganized.

This book challenges the food chain where humans are on top and animals fall below. Animals are third class citizens; they are overlooked, oppressed, and without voice (not dissimilar to the strata of human societies or races with one key difference - humans are already at the top, and we don't eat each other!!) Humans think of animals as part of nature; the animals see humans as animals themselves - and all animals have things in common. At the book's end, animals have become part of the capitalist hamster wheel - factories are converted to make products for both humans and animals, which increases their profit margin. An uneasy truce has been reached, but it is no real solution. The final message is: please try to get along; live and let live.

[Tim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not his best, but still engaging and very much containing Bradfield's unique perspective that always makes him interesting to read. I've heard it called a modern version of Orwell, and that's probably not exactly right, but it's close.