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The Lives of Animals:

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4 star:		(3)
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1 star:		(3)

 

 

This is an ingenuous work about animal rights, ethical treatment of animals and vegetarianism. I expected it to be a persuasive polemic on animal rights, and what I found was that it was a brilliant complilation of writings on a theme that raises many issues and questions on the relationships between humans and other animals with great respect for many viewpoints.

Coetzee (1940-), who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2003, is a critic and writer who was born in Cape Town, South Africa. His novels include: Dusklands, In the Heart of the Country, Waiting for the Barbarians, Life and Times of Michael K, Foe, Age of Iron, The Master of Petersburg and Elizabeth Costello. He's won the Booker Prize twice (the first author to do so). He also has written two volumes of autobiography. He has a Ph.D. in literature from the University of Texas at Austin,and also spent time, between his master's and doctorate, as a computer programmer. He's spent several stints in the United States as a visiting scholar.

I share this level of background on Coetzee because I think in this case, it is warranted. THE LIVES OF ANIMALS is a volume comprising many kinds of writing, fiction, argument, scholarly responses and, even I think, memoir in context. And it asks and doesn't answer the question of what Coetzee, personally, thinks of the ideas raised within.

The main text of THE LIVES OF ANIMALS comes from the 1997-1998 Tanner Lectures at Princeton University. Atypical of the usual philosophical essays given in the series, Coetzee read two short stories on the way humans treat and view and philosophize on animals, and within these stories, are lectures and question-and-answer series on animal issues. The main character, Elizabeth Costello (an apparent pre-apparition of the so-named Elizabeth Costello of his most recent novel), has been invited to lecture at Appleton College in America. A writer, she has been invited to speak on whatever she likes, and she chooses humanity's treatment of animals to talk about at several events. Her son, John, is a physics and astronomy professor there, and is hosting her -- he calls her interest in animal rights her "hobbyhorse." The son's wife, a philosophy professor who can't seem to get a tenure-track position in the same city as her husband, and his mother do not get along, and Costello's "radicalism" on animal rights confounds the son and irritates his wife to no end.

Coetzee's lecture was broken up into two sections, "The Philosophers and the Animals" and "The Poets and the Animals." In each, Costello deals with human treatment of animals in that context, among others. In the first, she gives a philosophical essy on animal treatment at the college, and in the second, she addresses a literature class using poets' treatment of animals as inspiration for her talk. Her last event is a debate.

During her lecture, Costello, who deeply and emotionally values the lives of animals, makes a connection between the Holocaust and the mechanized system of animal slaughter for food and byproducts in the developing world. This likening offends a literature professor, Dr. Stern, who declines to dine with Costello and her son along with other college elites that night at a special dinner. The next day, she receives a letter from him, including the lines, "You took for your own purposes the familiar comparison between the murdered Jews of Europe and slaughtered cattle. The Jews died like cattle, therefore cattle die like Jews, you say. That is a trick with words which I will not accept. ... Man is made in the likeness of God, but God does not have the likeness of man. If Jews were treated like cattle, it does not follow that cattle are treated like Jews..."

This is one example of an exchange within the main story of the book, and the rest follows this style, in which Costello raises issues, and an opposing point, in various settings, is raised in various demeanors and humors. Often, they are not settled, and the narrative gives no hint as to a right or moral authority on the issue. At the lecture, at the dinner, in the classroom, at the debate and in pillow talk at John's home with his philosopher wife. The point and counter point is woven within a compelling character sketch.

What follows in the book are essays in response to Coetzee's lectures by Wendy Doniger, the Mircea Eliade Distinguished Service Professor of the History of Religions at the University of Chicago; Marjorie Garber, William R. Kenan, Jr., professor of English at Harvard University and Director of Harvard's Center for Literary and Cultural Studies; Amy Gutmann (who wrote the introduction), Laurance S. Rockefeller University Professor at Princeton University, founding director of the University Center for Human Values; Peter Singer, professor in the Centre for Human Bioethics at Monash University; and Barbara Smuts, professor of psychology and anthropology at the University of Michigan. Each essay focuses on various aspects of Coetzee's characters' statements and viewpoints, drawing them out and parsing them, elaborating on the cultural background, and providing more point and counter point for consideration. One particularly charming piece is written as a fictional account of a poor professor asked to write a response to a lecture that was actually a short story... what is he to do?

I found the final piece by Smuts almost as compelling as the Coetzee fiction she was responding to. Smuts has spent countless hours observing wild primates, and she writes movingly of her interaction with baboons in the wild and Diane Fossey's gorilla groups. She writes also of her close relationship with her dog, Safi, who understands complete sentences and cooperates with Smuts out of mutual respect, not because Smuts controls her, Smuts asserts. She makes one of the most thoughtful observations in the book, that personal relationships are had with animals. "In the language I am developing here," she writes, "relating to other beings as persons has nothing to do with whether or not we attribute human characteristics to them. It has to do, instead, with recongizing that they are social subjects, like us, whose idiosyncratic, subjective experience of us plays the same role in their relations with us that our subjective experience of them plays in our relationships with them. If they relate to us as individuals, and we relate to them as individuals, it is possible for us to have a personal relationship."

The book, taken as a whole, invites strong consideration of how we use, view and relate to animals. Costello, who refuses to eat meat, admits that she wears leather shoes, stating it's "degrees of obscenity." Another writer asks if an unanticipated death after a happy life is cruel to the animal. And if it isn't, perhaps it is still bad -- bad for the killers even if not bad for the killed. Taken as a whole, the book reads as if the issue is still a question for Coetzee and the other writers, who continue to ask after the moral and ecological role of humanity as a whole. If not a question, the book is, certainly then, respectful, and for that reason alone should be read by anyone who wants to make a considered decision on the issue, whatever his or her final decision may be.

Way out of touch

I notice that the author of this book is a professor of English at Cape Town. That may explain his total ignorance of the premises of the ethical debate on the use of animals for food and medical experimentation as it is being carried on today in the United States.

This is supposed to be a fictional exposition of the issues raised by the treatment of animals in contemporary society. The idea is that a novelist is invited to give a lecture at an American university where her son is employed as an instructor. Instead of talking about novels, however, she advocates - Gasp! - Vegetarianism. Her son is outraged by this position, inexplicably. He wishes that she would stay away, never know her grandchildren, die, actually, simply because she is a vegetarian.

Now, it is true that the lecture given by the mother is very stupid. She has this idea that western culture regards the ability to reason as godlike, so that it justifies human exploitation of animals. No. Human reason has never been considered godlike; human reason is the result of the Fall. Poets and philosophers have always acknowledged the limitations of reason. So, the woman is no scholar. The text makes this excuse for her. Her son keeps fretting that argumentation is not his mother's strength, that she should not be doing this. Okay, but why publish this fictional woman's silly argument?

The son's attitudes are even more benighted. On the way to a dinner given for his mother, the son starts worrying about what will be served: "So are they, out of deference to vegetarianism, going to serve nut rissoles to everyone? Are her distinguished fellow guests going to have to fret through the evening dreaming of the pastrami sandwich or the cold drumstick they will gobble down when they get home?"

What planet is this guy from, anyway? I would suggest to Mr. J. M. Coetzee that if he ever has occasion to give a dinner on an American college campus, he had better have a vegetarian course.

The fictional section is followed by comments from four essayists on the issues raised by Coetzee's fiction. Since there is little of substance to discuss in the fiction, the commentators point out the problems of responding to an invalid argument presented by an unreliable fictional narrator, and this they do very nicely. But, why do it at all? This book is a sham.

The Lives of Animals by J.M. Coetzee is a philosophical look at the heart of vegetarianism and animal suffering rather than a discussion of the hard raw facts that most books include on the subject. It takes a look at both sides of the issue, including some hypothetical thought-provoking questions from the "opposition". This is done in the form of a short novel in which author Elizabeth Costello is invited to give two lectures to her literary peers.

She chooses to deliver her talks about the plight of animals, not by relating facts about slaughterhouses and veal crates, but by establishing certain theoretical truths about the way animals think and feel. "Reminding you only that the horrors I here omit are nevertheless at the center of this lecture," she says.

Coetzee's book presents the case for animal rights in a way I had never seen before. It offers some good answers for those who ask about our vegetarianism, and it raised many questions for us to answer for ourselves. The Lives of Animals reaffirmed why I had chosen this lifestyle in the first place and strengthened my resolution. No longer do I do this simply because I can't bear to be a cause of suffering, but rather because animals - as thinking, emotional beings - deserve it. A highly recommended this book that will renew convictions, but since it's heavy in philosophy it can be a little hard to follow. A collection of essays by various contributors following the story helps to clarify and extend the message of the book. --Reviewed by Rachel Crowley

Literature in many respects is very similar to music. In order to catch the subtle nuances, the beauty or message of the piece, requires more than one sitting. A single piece can appear deceptively simple on the first hearing or reading. But on closer examination, the book, poem or song takes on a more complex significance; you find yourself pouring over the work time and time again, digging deeper into its potential meaning. J.M. Coetzee's ~The Lives of Animals` is one such example.

This book is short, simple but elegantly written; containing ideas and arguments that could well take weeks to adequately unpack to reach a semblance of understanding of the many issues it proposes we ponder. In short, the novel concerns itself with the contentious issue of animal rights. More specifically, animal cruelty, in regards to our treatment of the edible, warm blooded variety: cattle, poultry et al. Reaching for a hard hitting comparison to make his point, Coetzee uses the Nazi concentrations camps and the genocide of the Jews as an example of how we currently treat and prepare the animals for slaughter in the henhouses and abattoirs around the planet. This comparison is flawed to some extent, (which a character in the novel points out) but Coetzee manages to make the similarities work as the novel progresses and the arguments are fleshed-out. However this is not the main thesis of the book.

The central question the book proposes we consider is whether animals have consciousness. And if they do have 'reasoning' consciousness, how can we justify their slaughter for our own gain? Our current Darwinian view of the world, that is, human beings hovering at the top of some evolutionary hierarchy, and all other living things falling in neat categories below, at the end of the 19th century, paved the way for some pretty horrific wars and some juicy justifications for the crimes committed in the 20th century. The Nazis used Darwin and his theories to justify their massive slaughter of Jews, gypsies, homosexuals and avant-garde artists, particularly the German Expressionists, calling it 'degenerative art'. Are animal's mere biological automatons? Are they 'degenerate', and therefore an easy target for exploitation? And if animals do have consciousness, what rights do they have?

This is not the place to launch into the arguments of animal rights or human rights for that matter. But what Coetzee has done with this exceptional book, is to present these important issues and complex philosophical arguments in a fictional format, enabling the subject to be more accessible to anyone interested in the way we treat our fellow creatures.

Spend an hour reading this book; then read it again - you will not be disappointed.

I have a bias for Afrikaans literature, as my father is an Afrikaner. In the case of this book, by Coetzee, I am not, all, persuaded by the animal rights movement: I continually eat meat without regret. However, I do believe that animals are more than we say they are. They have a sincerity which we lack. I will even say that plants have feelings, though science has not tried hard enough to find out.

I notice... that people put down Coetzee because he promotes animal rights... But that is besides the point... the arguments are ingeniously put together.

J.M. Coetzee is never comfortable to read. Nor is he here.

The book is a game, a riddle. The fictional form is simply a device. An ageing Australian author goes to visit her son at an American university. Her purpose is to give a speech and to attend a dinner. She chooses to explore the lives of animals.

Coetzee's aim is not, apparently, to make friends, to espouse any particular point of view, or to convince anybody of anything. But he needles. And he teases. There is not a page in this slim and brilliantly efficient book that doesn't include some idea, or a challenge to received ideas, to confront us and to invite us to think more deeply.

That is his achievement.

At the end, any comfortable ideology we took into the book has been exposed. I defy anyone to read it and not to think in a new way about the processes of reason, the homo-centric nature of man, and - more than anything - about the lives of animals, whose place on this planet has never been so tenuous.

J. M. Coetzee is known for his critical eye in his novels and essays. With 'The lives of animals', Coetzee now turns that eye to the issue of animal cruelty, and he does it in a novel way that, to my judgement, is very effective.

The issue of animal cruelty is so emotionally charged that it is virtually impossible to deal with it only from the realm of Western philosophy. On the one hand, Western philosophy tends to be too detached from the subject discussed. In making the issue more 'rational', Western philosophy loses its power to impact and to convince. On the other hand, Western philosophy is rarely accessible to most people, mainly because its language is so arcane that only an intellectual elite can understand it. In other words, animal cruelty, approached from the point of view of Western philosophy, becomes another academic issue, almost entirely alienated from the gruesome reality out there--a reality that needs to be exposed and addressed in more practical terms. With 'The lives of animals', Coetzee seems to be saying just that, and he deftly uses literature to approach the issue because only literature can make philosophy accessible and deal with emotions.

Does Coetzee succeed in his enterprise? I think he did, but he does it by leaving everything unresolved. It seems that Coetzee is saying that, ultimately, it's a matter of personal choice and commitment. Since the issue is so complex, since so many variables enter into the equation, since any side can defend itself with any arguments just as convincingly, we are left on our own, with our own contradictions. Coetzee deserves to be credited for exposing the complexity of the issue, not in providing easy, sloganistic answers.

The four commentaries to Coetzee's text attest to the complexity of the issue. I found Peter Singer's reflections particularly germane. He says:

'I feel, but I also think about what I feel. When people say we should only feel--and at times Costello [Coetzee's main 'character' in his text] comes close to that in her lecture--I'm reminded of Goring, who said, 'I think with my blood.' See where it led him. We can't take our feelings as moral data, immune from rational criticism.'

I also found Barbara Smuts' reflections illuminating because of the wealth of her experience as researcher in animal behavior. Her thesis that we should learn to treat animals as 'persons' is cogently exposed, and deserves to be taken into account if we are to make any progress in treating animals properly.

In short, I recommend this little book to anyone interested in the issue of animal cruelty. It should be, indeed, required reading in some course on ethics to generate debate and try to come with more convincing and comprehensive anwers.

I'm not a vegetarian or a fighter for anyone's rights. The fable told here I find generous and touching, the comments long-winded. The activists will think the opposite. I trust the story: my stars go to the teller.

It's telling that Coetzee is unable to put his own name to the views espoused by the batty Elizabeth Costello, his protagonist. Using the "postmodern" artifice of putting what are not necessarily his own views into a fictional character simply allows him to distance himself from the argument. Peter Singer, for all his faults, hits the nail on the head with his own parody but the other commentaries are pointless meanderings that add nothing to the central argument. I couldn't figure out, for example, what Smuts was trying to say (if anything) about the use of animals as food with her sentimental tract on living with animals. And what on earth is Doniger talking about in her anthropological self-promotion (an advertisement for her own books). There can be no serious defence of the radical animal rights position. It does not accord with what happens in nature and makes just as many assumptions about what animals are supposed to "feel" and "think" as the carnivores who chomp away believing their "victims" are mere fleshy robots. Nature is red in tooth and claw, as the expression goes, and we are no different (in principle) to the predators in the jungle who tear their prey limb from limb without a thought for their victims pain. Should we morally abhor the behavior of natural predators? Of course not, because they have no moral agency. But if they have no moral agency then that surely DOES make them different to us? Thus the animal rights philosophers must either condemn natural predators as evildoers (thanks, W) OR concede that animals are different to us! I I see no evidence for this in their writings; instead they would have us believe that animals are equivalent "souls" to ours - what pathetic nonsense! None of them have been able to draw the line at when an animal can be considered to have rights (ants, scorpions, snakes, frogs, sharks etc. or for that matter plants as another reviewer suggests)...of course they can't because none has the faintest idea what any of these animals is actually "thinking". Singer gives the game away in his essay...the argument is drawn with a fuzzy, warm, friendly family dog and that is where the animal rights sentimentalists get their indignation from. Not from the filthy dung beetle or the darwinist jungle dweller but from the pet population. Coetzee should come out from behind his fictional cover and confess to the irrationalism that his protagonist is accused of in his text. Norma - who criticizes Costello - is the one on the right end of the argument.

Ladies and Gentleman- What about plants? They participate in respiration, reproduction, growth, death, and energy production and consumption. How can one step on an ant and also play baseball? The answer--one can't, both kill living organisms. We kill magnificent trees for windows, so we can separate ourselves from the outdoors with a clear slate of glass. We kill winter wheat for our own selfish desires. We manage to chop off the faces of sunflowers for salty indulgences. Where will it end? We should be ashamed of ourselves. Perception=Ability to Engage=Possibility=Creativity=Living. AMEN! Free both the circus elephant and the blade of grass! FREEDOM!