Welcome to Litsy!

From the story 'Child's Play'

Professor Dallerhyde spends his afternoons outside the London Zoo cage of a pair of Hackenfeller's Apes, Percy and Edwina, frustrated in his attempts to study their mating habits by Percy's dolorous indifference to his companion. Then Kendrick arrives, informing Dallerhyde that Percy has been requisitioned for a one-way experimental trip on a space rocket, and the Professor's morals and sentimentality mix to formulate an escape plan... 4🐒
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"Radiant and full-leafed, the Park was alive with the murmuring vibration of the species which made it its preserve."

#FirstLineFridays @shybookowl

I like the way the novel starts with a zoologist's-eye-view of creatures cavorting and disporting themselves in their natural environment, the identity of the animals shortly disclosed when it is revealed that some of them are playing cricket ?

"He enjoyed the sunshine on his face and the patterns of the white dust at his feet. The persistence of the aeroplane's noise, however, reminded him of an uneasiness in himself. Uneasiness seemed to be the background of all ruminations belonging to the twentieth century, just as all its landscapes were presided over, somewhere in the distance, by an aeroplane." ☀️✈️?️

"Once we acknowledge sentiment in other animals, we are bound to acknowledge what follows: their right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."
- Brigid Brophy

[Quotation not necessarily from the tagged book ?]

A 1953 satire about animal rights. The blurb says that Brophy's 1965 manifesto, "The Rights of Animals," kick-started the modern animal rights movement, so she has good credentials. Her other biographical details say she also campaigned for prison reform, gay rights, pacifism, humanism and vegetarianism, so I'm expecting to find "Hackenfeller's Ape" hitting my marks ??

#BigMoon three moon titles
I saw PaperMoon at the drive in as a child and loved Tatum. Apparently its based on an obscure novel?
#falling
@eggs
@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

I‘m currently reading my 7th Elizabeth Jane Howard with @shawnmooney and this one is a volume of her short stories. We‘ve been working through her books in publication order (and may even get to the start of The Cazalet Chronicles next year 😆).

I found this surprisingly riveting at times, though some parts are slow. It charts both the census itself and the things it recorded, touching on things like industrialisation, the Highland Clearances, the Potato Famine, emigration, immigration, WWI, WWII... all kinds of things which affected the population of the UK. Also there's a bit on the wider “British Empire“.

Today's reading is getting me off to a good start with #BookSpinBingo!

Didn't share my May stats!