Bears: A Brief History

The way we look at nature is a complicated thing -- we love it, but we also fear it and despoil it. It might be fun to read another book describing our conflicted relationship with "the world around us," but it would not be as fun as reading a book about our relationship with bears. Bears turn out to be, in all ways that are important, a more than adequate proxy for the abstraction that is "nature," so this wonderful book by Bernd Bruner about bears tells us a lot about our conflicted relationship to the rest of the nonhuman world. Bruner's book is a collection of observations about bears made by different kinds of people in different times and places. It's really more about people than about bears. We learn, for example, what prehistoric people may have thought about bears, according to cave paintings and archeological finds. We read what some eighteenth century explorers wrote about the strange and exotic bears they encountered in their travels. We hear how bears were abused by the Romans, worshipped by the pagans, feared by the Europeans, and loved by Timothy Treadwell (before a bear decided to kill and eat him). Again and again, Bruner shows us that humans have loved, feared, and despised bears, and that the end result of almost all of these attitudes have been bad for bears (and occasionally bad for people). He argues instead for a live-and-let-live approach. We should recognize that bears don't want very much to do with us, and that we should do our best to leave them alone. Don't tap their bile and keep them in a cage; but don't raise them in your own home and feed them from baby bottles, either. Admire them from afar and give them plenty of their own space. After reading about all the goofy behavior that bears have inspired among people, this argument seems very, very persuasive.

Bernd Brunner's fine book is both a solid description of the various types of bears and a cultural study of people's preoccupation with them. For centuries people in the Northern Hemisphere considered them our nearest relatives (apes being unknown). But Bruner writes: "Our interactions with bears are laden with mixed feelings: our forebears venerated, killed, caressed, tortured, nurtured, ate, respected, and despised them." Brunner surveys folklore and early human attempts to classify bears and understand their behavior. He analyzes why teddy bears are so popular and how Kipling's Baloo evolved into the Disney cartoon's hayseed. Brunner explores the saga of Grizzly Adams (1812-1860), an eccentric showman and hunter who captured and trained the big animals, putting on a series of shows. Adams was attacked and seriously injured more than once by bears. His story is well told in The True Adventures of Grizzly Adams: A Biography. Timothy Treadwell spent many summers living in Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska, interacting with and filming brown bears. In 2003, a bear killed and partially ate Treadwell and his girlfriend. Using Treadwell's own footage, Werner Herzog made the documentary Grizzly Man about Treadwell. "Simply dismissing Treadwell as more or less disturbed, irresponsible or lacking in proper judgment is too simple. Although he was indeed incapable of drawing the boundaries necessary to protect his own life, his story is inconceivable if we disregard the longing for a kinship with bears and the wish to coexist with them that peacefully motivated him - a desire likely born from hearing a multitude of unrealistic stories about humans connecting with these animals." In the chapter "Bears on Show," Brunner considers how humans have used bears in performances. "But is it really possible to train a bear without using violence? Such a feat is very unlikely." He describes the terrible methods that have been used to teach bears to dance and do other tricks. Brunner writes that bears "are in trouble today in much of the world for a number of reasons." On "bear farms" in southeast Asia, the gall bladders of sun bears are tapped for their bile, which is sold as a cure-all. In North America, highways and development often isolate bears in small territories and small communities that that weakens the species. (The Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative seeks to create corridors for bears to move safely through larger territories.) Even global warming comes into play; Grizzlies are moving north as thawing ice reduces the range of Polar bears, pitting the two species against each other. Beautifully produced, carefully written, interesting and amusing illustrations -- altogether, a delight for this reviewer. Robert C. Ross 2008

As the owner of a vast bear library, I always welcome the rare bear book that documents the historical relationship between people and bears. Along with very interesting text, this book is full of photos and illustrations that help paint the picture of our past relationship with this fascinating and wonderful animal. Mr. Brunner did his homework with this book and therefore warrants a spot on the "top shelf" of my bear library. Well done Mr. Brunner, well done!!

This concise cultural history of bears in human culture is in an excellent translation which I could not stop reading. Packed full of historical illustrations, this is required reading for anyone who wants to better understand his/her own relationship with bears and the place of bears in the human imagination. The potentially dry confusing classification of bears is handled deftly and made fascinating. This is the rare non-fiction book which you will not be able to put down until you feel the satisfaction of consuming its contents.