BOOKS: The Raven Who Spoke With God

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2003:

The Raven Who Spoke With God by Christopher Foster
Singing Spirit Books (4127 Ash Ct., Loveland, CO 80538), 2001.
148 pages, paperback. $12.95.

Joshua, The Raven Who Spoke With God, is more-or-less kin
to Jonathan Livingston Seagull, the title-bird of the 1973 best
seller by Richard Bach, reissued to renewed success in 1995. Those
who like spiritual bird stories seem to be as enthralled with Joshua
as they were with Jonathan, judging from the many rave reviews
published elsewhere.

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Chronology of humane progress (Part 1 of two parts: from Moses to Walt Disney)

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2003:
Chronology of humane progress
(Part 1 of two parts: from Moses to Walt Disney)
by Merritt Clifton

1300 B.C. — Hebrew law as proclaimed by
Moses includes provisions for humane slaughter
and care of work animals.

740 B.C. — Rise of Isaiah, the most
prominent of the Hebrew vegetarian prophets, and
the prophet who most emphasized opposition to
animal sacrifice.

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BOOKS: Sonya Fitzpatrick, The Pet Psychic

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2003:

Sonya Fitzpatrick, The Pet Psychic:
What the animals tell me by Sonya Fitzpatrick
Berkley Pub Group (c/o Penguin Putnam Inc., 375 Hudson St.,
New York, NY 10014), 2003. 272 pages, hardcover. $21.95.

The Pet Psychic is just too dumb to finish.
In childhood, Sonya Fitzpatrick claims, she had a hearing
impairment that made her relate better to animals and made her more
aware of her psychic/telepathic powers. Then one holiday her father
cooked her pet geese. Fitzpatrick became so traumatized that she
turned off her communication with animals, and didn’t start again
until she was an adult.

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BOOKS: More Than a Meal

From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  April 2003:

More Than A Meal:
The Turkey in History,
Myth,  Ritual,  and Reality
by Karen Davis,  Ph.D.
Lantern Books (One Union Square West,
Suite 201,  New York,  NY  10003),  2001.
192 pages,  paperback.  $20.00

This review appears on the same page as the conclusion of the
first installment of my “Chronology of Humane Progress,”  an attempt
to put into context the major ideas and events that over the past
3,300 years have often falteringly coalesced into the global animal
protection cause of today.
The second installment ends with the major events of 1998,  to give
current and recent developments at least five years to settle before
trying to decide what really made a difference and what was just part
of the flow.

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Animal obituaries

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2003–

Roadway, a semi-feral cat known to many as “the cat who
plays with deer,” and famously photographed in an encounter with a
wild turkey, was rescued by the Rocky Mountain Alley Cat Alliance in
1990 from a Denver warehouse after he arrived as a stowaway on a
Roadway truck from Ohio. On March 19, 2003, one day after 51
inches of wet snow blanketed his habitat, Roadway developed a
urinary tract blockage. Friends and neighbors hauled him one and a
half miles by snowshoe and 20 miles by highway to a veterinary
clinic, where after successful surgery he pulled a catheter from his
leg and bled to death. –Audrey Boag

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BOOKS: The Nine Emotional Lives of Cats

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2003:

The Nine Emotional Lives of Cats:
A Journey Into The Feline Heart
by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson
Ballantine books (c/o Random House, 1540 Broadway,
New York, NY 10036), 2002. 240 pages. $24.95 hardcover.

Cats, enigmatic creatures, what are they all about? What
are their emotions? How do they experience the world?
Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson, author of Dogs Never Lie About
Love (1997), who now lives in New Zealand with five cats, purports
to reveal many feline secrets in The Nine Emotional Lives of Cats.
Other observers might disagree with many of his beliefs.
According to Masson, the nine basic emotional states of cats
include narcissism, love, contentment, attachment, jealousy,
fear, anger, curiosity, and playfulness, often in mixed
combination.

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Obituaries

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2003:

Fred Rogers, 74, died from cancer on
February 27 at his home in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania. A strict vegetarian, Rogers
taught on his television show Mister Rogers’
Neighborhood that “True wisdom is never separate
from compassion.” Rogers debuted in children’s
television in 1954 as a puppeteer for The
Children’s Corner, aired by WQED-Pittsburgh.
Ordained as a Presbyterian minister in 1963,
Rogers was assigned to continue working in TV.
Later in 1963 Rogers developed a 15-minute show
called Misterogers for the Canadian Broadcasting
Corporation. He returned the show to Pittsburgh
in 1966, and expanded it into Mister Rogers’
Neighborhood for the Eastern Educational Network.
It was picked up by National Educational
Television in 1968, which later became the
Public Broadcasting Service. Rogers produced
more than 1,700 episodes. He retired due to
declining health in 2000, but returned to the
air briefly in 2001 to reassure children about
the goodness of the world and their ability to
make it better after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

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Cockfighting foes face hard fight to keep Oklahoma initiative gains

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2003:

OKLAHOMA CITY–Oklahoma cockfighters are not just taking
their battle to stay in business to the state Supreme Court; they
are trying to take the state Supreme Court off the case.
Oklahoma voters approved an initiative banning cockfighting
in November 2002, 56%-44%, but in 57 sparsely populated rural
counties, of 77 counties in all, the majority voted to keep
cockfighting legal.
Local judges in 27 of the 57 rural counties soon thereafter
held the anti-cockfighting initiative to have been unconstitutional.
The first prosecution under the initiative was attempted by
the Kingfisher County sheriff’s department in early December, after
one Luis Rangel was found with more than 100 suspected gamecocks
while sheriffs’ deputies were investigating an alleged case of horse
neglect. But Kingfisher County assistant district attorney Ard Gates
on December 5 refused to press the case against Rangel.

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BOOKS: Heaven and Earth and I

From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  March 2003:

Heaven and Earth and I:  Ethics of Nature Conservation in Asia
Edited by Vivek Menon & Masayuki Sakamoto
Penguin Enterprise (c/o Penguin Putnam Inc.,  375 Hudson St.,  New
York,  NY  10014),  2002.
Published in association with the Wildlife Trust of India,
International Fund for Animal Welfare,  and Asian Conservation
Alliance.
223 pages,  paperback.  No U.S. price listed.

Eighteen essayists contribute to Heaven and Earth and I,
including the Dalai Lama,  Queen Noor of Jordan,  the Prince
Sadruddin Aga Khan,  Maneka Gandhi,  and King Gyanendra Bir Bikram
Dev of Nepal–but the famous names discuss the ethics of nature
conservation only in broad and general terms,  for the most part,
with only People for Animals founder Mrs. Gandhi having much to say
about animals.

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