Michael Nichols: Brutal Kinship

A sad tale of the many ways we mistreat our nearest relatives, BRUTAL KINSHIP is a photographic excursion aimed at the heart. Nichols and Goodall have been working together for a decade to raise awareness about chimpanzees, to save the species from extinction and to end the butcher-shop, pet business, scientific and entertainment industry abuse that is prevalent world wide. To anyone with even passing familiarity with Goodall's life and work these past 40 years, the pain she must feel visiting laboratories where chimps are imprisoned in life-long isolation, slowly going mad while being infected with human diseases seems nearly unbearable. As she asks, "How should we relate to beings who look into mirrors and see themselves as individuals, who mourn companions and may die of grief, who have a consciousness of `self'? Don't they deserve to be treated with the same sort of consideration we accord to other highly sensitive, conscious beings -- ourselves? For ethical reasons, we no longer perform certain experiments on humans; I suggest that it would only be logical to refrain from doing those experiments on chimpanzees too." Logical, indeed. Michel Nichols, whose words and photos comprise most of this volume, has captured the wild beauty and complex interaction of natural chimp society, as well as the abject state of captive creatures. The juxtaposition of these opposites says it all. Would you treat your worst enemy the way we treat the chimps? And when will it end? A powerfully moving statement from two deeply dedicated defenders of the wild.

Brutal Kinship wonderfully showcases Michael Nichols' artistic and lovely color photos which are perfect accompaniments to wildlife expert Jane Goodall's informed and informative essay backing up the photos as she deftly explains and explores the relationship between humankind and the chimp. The gorgeous, striking, and often memorably stunning photography pack discussions of chimp issues and human treatment. Brutal Kinship is a welcome and entertaingly educational contribution to personal, academic, and community library Animal Photography collections.

This book's power lies in its pictures, not in the few words Nichols and Goodall provide. While the authors' commentary is accurate and moving, nothing can compare to the shock of realizing that the irregularly shaped blotch above an anesthetized chimp's head is his detached scalp. The reader is confronted with image after image of chimps, both in the wild and in captivity. To the authors' credit, they reveal instances of violence among chimps, from hunting to warfare, suggesting a genetic legacy of aggression among both men and chimps.Despite the shocking and disturbing material, this book also affirms the beauty of chimps. The final picture of the series is of two orphaned juveniles living in an African sanctuary. They are standing upright, embracing, with expressions reminding me of two schoolyard buddies as they decide to face the bullies together.This is indeed a difficult book to page through. After I had bought this book, I left it on my desk for several weeks before I had the courage to crack it, but, when I finally did, I was glad I had. The brutality on display here contrasts sharply with the gentle love the authors have for chimps and their cause. Sometimes we need to see the truth before we can accept it, and this book will go a long way to strengthening public support for protecting primates.