Commonplace Book

'At eight in the morning, a bear of well over six hundred pounds comes prowling around the sandy embankment to the south of the small clearing at Elohin. Volodya has filled some cans with seal fat to attract the animals, and now he murmurs, "Ah, too bad it isn't about a third of a mile to the north, outside the preserve, we could shoot it." I feel suddenly numb with despair. We ought to have a little bit of our neocortex removed at birth to neutralise our desire to destroy the world. Man is a capricious child who believes the Earth is his bedroom, the animals his toys, the trees his baby rattles.'

from The Consolations of the Forest by Sylvain Tesson (May 9)