Exercise 1: Writing from the perspective of a nonhuman animal.
Each of the stories in the trail is about an animal, told from the perspective of a human storyteller. Choose one of these stories and retell it from the animal’s perspective.
Consider which narrative perspective you will take. A first person narrative gives the animal a voice to speak directly to the reader – think of the opening line of Moby Dick: “Call me Ishmael.” A second person narrative address the reader directly as ‘you’ –consider Choose Your Own Adventure novels which invite the reader to make choices about which paths to take through the book, or the story in this project ‘Uncollected Human’ in which Peter Minter addresses you directly. Third person narratives are told from the perspective of an observer, and often follow multiple characters and story arcs.
After you have written your story, reflect:
What does this shift to a nonhuman storyteller do?
Why did you choose a particular narrative perspective (first, second or third person) and what did that perspective allow you to do?
What kinds of opportunities for understanding does it open?
What potential dangers are there in trying to inhabit the perspective of another species?
Exercise 2: Experiencing the world from the perspective of a nonhuman animal.
Choose an animal from one of the stories, or an animal you encountered somewhere else in the museum. Quietly observe the museum as if you were in the body of that animal. You may need to crouch down for an animal that is lower to the ground than you, or look down from a higher level for an animal that is taller or could fly.
Document the world from this new perspective:
You could take photographs or sketch what you can see.
You could write ‘field notes’ about what you observe, considering what you can see but also hear, smell and feel.
Fodder to think with:
Stories with animal narrators, or animal characters who speak human languages, are common in children’s fiction, and appear in myths, fables and fairytales from around the world. Adult fiction, other than fantasy or allegorical works such as George Orwell’s Animal Farm, tends to shy away from talking animals. Some notable exceptions are books written from the perspective of real animals, holding a mirror to human-nonhuman relationships: Ceridwen Dovey’s Only the Animals is a collection of stories told from the perspective of animals caught up in human conflicts; Verlyn Klinkenborg’s Timothy: or, Notes of an Abject Reptile is based on the life of a female tortoise who lived in naturalist Gilbert White’s garden, and James Lever’s Me Cheeta: The Autobiography tells the true story of the infamous chimp from the Hollywood Tarzan movies, with significant poetic license. How else could we encounter the world through the perspectives of other animals?