The Hopes of Snakes: And Other Tales from the Urban Landscape

by Lisa Couturier

Book Overview

"Couturier's essays shine with her candor, her perception, and her affection for the creatures of our world. Whether the subject is a snake or a falcon or a crow named Edgar, these essays will both enlighten and give much reading pleasure." -Mary Oliver In The Hopes of Snakes, Lisa Couturier celebrates the stories of forgotten, overlooked animals who have adapted nobly to city and suburban life in the Northeast. With sharp perception and deep humanity,...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0807085650
• ISBN13: 9780807085653
• Release Date: January 2006
• Publisher: Beacon Press
• Length: 176 Pages
• Weight: 0.46 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 5.6" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

Poignant tales for our times

I live near an eight-lane freeway, and every time I hit the onramp, I look for the red-tailed hawk that can be seen most days scanning for his prey from his perch on a light pole. He would no doubt prefer better hunting grounds than this ice plant thatch that shelters suburban rodents, but after we humans filled in the nearby wetlands and covered the hills with house tracts, this is about all we've left for him. My daily glimpse of him is a vitamin to me, and a reminder that I don't have to travel to a national park to have an encounter with wildlife. For readers who routinely seek soul-restoring encounters with all that is wild, Lisa Couturier's The Hopes of Snakes will be a tonic. To refer to this book as a collection of essays would create a far too stuffy impression of it. Part of the subtitle, Tales from the Urban Landscape, pegs it precisely: this is a collection of personal reminiscences, musings, meditations and analyses that make for darn good storytelling. The common thread that stitches together all of these tales with a seamless cohesiveness is Couturier's abiding respect for wild animals, many species of which are scorned and hated when they edge themselves back into habitats that were stolen from them by humans. True to its title, there are uplifting tales here, not just of snakes, but of coyotes, turkey vultures, pigeon ladies, and many others. Nevertheless, this is not an anthology of sticky-sweet, cute animal stories. The overriding tone is one of reverence, not sentimentality. Even so, Couturier's poignance is often moving, and when you read "Take the Long Way Home," a posthumous letter of thanks to Mr. Boyd, Couturier's neighbor and mentor of her high school years, you just might find yourself shedding a tear or two. Even in the deepest heart of a city, the animal world is all around us, as my freeway redtail reminds me every day. The Hopes of Snakes will help you rediscover, in case you ever forgot it, that despite all our collective efforts to turn wilderness into "civilization," humankind does not exist in isolation from our animal kindred.

A celebration of the underlying world of animals

Students of urban natural history and casual readers alike receive a celebration of Northeast urban wildlife in The Hopes Of Snakes & Other Tales From The Urban Landscape. Her thirteen essays observe urban animals from Manhattan skyscraper-dwelling falcons to mice who live on the subway tracks of New York. Wildlife has adapted to human habitations in surprising ways: hers is a celebration of the underlying world of animals which live alongside people.

Living with our fellow creatures

Lisa writes about her experiences with wildlife that occupy cities and suburbia and how they interact with humans. As Lisa writes, some animals fare very well while others do not. Lisa's ability to capture small details about the cirtters with whom she interacts make her essays all the more endearing and important. Although accused of anthropomorphising about the surivivors of the Human onslaught, her descriptions present an important understanding of urban wildlife and enable many otherwise unknowing citydwellers the opportunity to engage with nature's cast outs. As Julie Warner said in Doc Hollywood: "Most people are merely on the Earth, not a part of it." Lisa Couturier gives us the opportunity to experience first hand those rare species that share their world with the Human invaders.

Have You Ever Read a Book You Wished Would Never End?

The Hopes of Snakes is just such a book. From Manhattan to Washington, DC, Lisa Couturier takes her readers on an amazing journey by introducing us to things we may have taken for granted or may never have thought twice (or even once) about. As I have been reading the essays, my family and friends have had to endure my reading passages or quoting from the text, but none acted as though it were much of a struggle because the prose so ably draws one in. Ms. Couturier not only writes with the beauty of a poet, she teaches along the way so that the reader comes away feeling thoughtful and enriched. I knew nothing about crows other than myths, but now, because I have read A Banishment of Crows, I look for them in the sky, count their numbers, am awed by and respect them. In her essay, The Hopes of Snakes, she becomes the readers' hero because she does what we wish we could do in similar circumstances. The essays reflect humor and sorrow and never shy away from the unpleasant. By the end, the reader closes the book, feeling fulfilled by the journey, and yet compelled to assert onself more fully in the environment so that not a moment is lost and the connection will remain. I have hopes that this will be the first of many books by Lisa Couturier.

MORE THAN NATURE: A GREAT AND TIMELESS READ

"THE HOPES OF SNAKES" is a great and timeless read. These essays may remind one of Edward Albee's tension provoking plays and of David Sedaris's dark humor. The essay 'Take the Long Way Home' can sit right next to that provocative genre of southern writers--right next to Faulkner's "AS I LAY DYING" or maybe "LIGHT IN AUGUST." You can roll Couturier's words and descriptive phrases over your tongue like a sweet mint julep. These essays tangle and weave classic coming-of-age tales through muddy swamps, over rocky shores, and into dark and scary woods to bring us to the point where an enlightened woman with an inclination for the wild can thrive in Manhattan and then return to Washington, DC, to enjoy the roots of an ancestral home and the blessings of motherhood. Couturier trades primeval forests for concrete canyons, but the message is an ancient and ongoing one. Anyone can read this book, but it will take a thoughtful reader to grasp and appreciate Couturier's depth. Don't pigeonhole this group of essays into a nice, neat urban nature read. It is so much more. The writing is likely to spring at you and bite you like a coiled and sleeping snake that's been poked and provoked.