'To be gentle is to resist the privileging of command above compassion. It is a quiet voice, a persistent whisper, calm and consoling. Ferocity is an armour, a forceful expression of resolve and protection. To be fierce is to know the intensity of the edges of feeling. It is the voice that calls out, intending to be heard.
'Having spent her life in city environments, Vanessa Berry’s experiences with animals have largely been through encounters in urban settings, representations in art and the media, and as decorative ornaments or kitsch. The essays in Gentle and Fierce suggest that these encounters provide meaningful connections, at a time when the world we share with animals is threatened by environmental destruction. Berry responds with attentiveness and empathy to her subjects, which include a stuffed Kodiak bear, a Japanese island overrun with rabbits, a porcelain otter and Georges Perec’s cat. The essays are accompanied by illustrations which reflect her eye for detail and her background as an artist and zine maker.'
Source : publisher's blurb
'When I first sat down with Vanessa Berry’s collection of essays, Gentle and Fierce, we were in the midst of another destabilising Covid wave. One of the images from her collection that stayed with me was the latticework of letters on Sylvia Plath’s grave, which Berry visited in Yorkshire. The notes, left on Plath’s grave by admirers, had been eaten by snails. One handwritten co-contribution reads Sylvia, know that your words live on, even though you are gone, with the words ‘even though’ interrupted by ‘a string of irregular, squarish holes with curled edges, the work of snails’. While a slow-moving gastropod differs from a rapidly replicating virus, I could not help but think of the gaps the virus has created, not just through death, but in supply chains, leadership, our patience. And while a virus is not an animal, insect, or gastropod, it has forced us to pay attention to the fact that the nonhuman world has intentions of its own. Berry’s collection of essays likewise compels its readers to attend to the presence of our nonhuman companions.' (Introduction)
'Gentle and Fierce is a book of essays that provides glimpses of Sydney author Vanessa Berry’s life by dissecting her encounters with non-human animals in various contexts – in the household, in captivity, in art and in the form of ornamental objects. Through Berry’s encounters with animals, we piece together her life as a city-dweller and an intellectual, a solitary who is as much an observer of other humans as of the animal world. Her essays allude to the destruction of the natural world and the marginalisation of other life forms by humans as Berry strives to connect with nature despite a paucity of opportunities to do so. ' (Introduction)
'There are complex, fundamental questions around how we relate to non-human animals. How can we find a way to organise our systems so they are not exploitative or degrading and are not poisoning the land and water we all depend on? What might a genuinely sustainable ethic of cross-species interdependence look like? Are our cultural stories and mythologies about animals harmful or helpful?' (Introduction)
'There are complex, fundamental questions around how we relate to non-human animals. How can we find a way to organise our systems so they are not exploitative or degrading and are not poisoning the land and water we all depend on? What might a genuinely sustainable ethic of cross-species interdependence look like? Are our cultural stories and mythologies about animals harmful or helpful?' (Introduction)
'Gentle and Fierce is a book of essays that provides glimpses of Sydney author Vanessa Berry’s life by dissecting her encounters with non-human animals in various contexts – in the household, in captivity, in art and in the form of ornamental objects. Through Berry’s encounters with animals, we piece together her life as a city-dweller and an intellectual, a solitary who is as much an observer of other humans as of the animal world. Her essays allude to the destruction of the natural world and the marginalisation of other life forms by humans as Berry strives to connect with nature despite a paucity of opportunities to do so. ' (Introduction)
'When I first sat down with Vanessa Berry’s collection of essays, Gentle and Fierce, we were in the midst of another destabilising Covid wave. One of the images from her collection that stayed with me was the latticework of letters on Sylvia Plath’s grave, which Berry visited in Yorkshire. The notes, left on Plath’s grave by admirers, had been eaten by snails. One handwritten co-contribution reads Sylvia, know that your words live on, even though you are gone, with the words ‘even though’ interrupted by ‘a string of irregular, squarish holes with curled edges, the work of snails’. While a slow-moving gastropod differs from a rapidly replicating virus, I could not help but think of the gaps the virus has created, not just through death, but in supply chains, leadership, our patience. And while a virus is not an animal, insect, or gastropod, it has forced us to pay attention to the fact that the nonhuman world has intentions of its own. Berry’s collection of essays likewise compels its readers to attend to the presence of our nonhuman companions.' (Introduction)
