King Solomon's Ring: New Light on Animals' Ways

Truly filled with wonder

“Without supernatural assistance, our fellow creatures can tell us the most beautiful stories, and that means true stories, because the truth about nature is always far more beautiful even than what our great poets sing of it, and they are the only real magicians that exist.” This book is wonderful in the original sense of that word, filled with wonder, and this quote from the Preface explains one reason this is so. Another reason is the sense that one is sitting peacefully on a pleasant evening while a true raconteur quietly meanders through his unexpectedly mesmerizing tales.

I originally picked up this book looking for material to liven up a natural history essay on shrews; those tiny overlooked but show more wide-spread creatures better known as metaphors than animals. This classic book from a legendary naturalist includes one of the very few bits of writing on shrews outside formal scientific literature. Surely, I thought, Lorenz would have something interesting to say. In fact, he had many interesting things to say on shrews. After finding that he could tell an entertaining and informative tale that brought these apparently unexciting animals to life on the page, I naturally had to start back at the beginning and read the book through.

Each chapter treats a different topic and can stands on its own. But read together they bring an understanding greater than their sum. Lorenz’s skilled storytelling gradually reveals that what at first appeared to be many different threads are all actually part of one wonderful fabric. show less

If the scenes from a book stay with you for decades then it is a sign that the book must be really good. Konrad Lorenz won a noble prize for his work on animal behavior. He explained that one of his principles for studying animal behavior was to study them in the wild and not in captivity since that so strongly impacted their behavior. King Solomon's Ring talks, in popular language, about his studies of fish and birds in particular explaining the sometimes embarrassing lengths he went to in order to perform his studies. The result is an endearing and frequently amusing look at the animal world suitable for readers of any age.

I had read this book when I was a kid and found Konrad Lorenz's stories about how he studied animal behavior to show more be charming. The illustrations are also perfect for the book although not effectively reproduced in the ebook edition. show less

King Solomon's Ring is considered a classic on the subject of animal behavior. Konrad Lorenz was an ethologist (someone who studies animal behavior) who raised many animals at his home to study. Although he raised the animals and kept them at his home, he gave them free range of his home and the world around him in order to get a more realistic view of their behavior in their natural environment. In this book, Lorenz tells the reader about his observations of a number of animal species. The writing of the books is observational rather than scientific and very accessible to someone without a science background. One thing I found especially interesting is how World War II seemed to have affected Lorenz. He was German and much of his show more research was done in the 1930s and beyond. Although the book is about his observations of the animals, there are times when he allows how the war affected him to seep into the writing. For example after observing two doves tear each other apart in when he put them together in a cage for breeding purposes he writes, "Only in two other instances have I seen similar horrible lacerations inflicted on their own kind by vertebrates: once, as an observer of the embittered fights of cichlid fishes who sometimes actually skin each other, and again as a field surgeon, in the late war, where the highest of all vertebrates perpetrated mass mutilations on members of his own species." I would recommend this book to anyone interested in animal behavior or animals in general. There is a fun section on dogs and how their behavior is influenced by their wolf or jackal ancestors. show less

A well-written and engrossing series of essays on the natural world, animal behavior and our relationships with animals. I don't remember a lot about the specifics of the author's ideas since I read it for a college class, but I remember the gist of it was a suggestion to treat the animal world with the proper respect. At the time, this was heretical stuff.

King Solomon’s Ring by Konrad Lorenz, an Austrian ethologist, is not your typical science book in that it is written with a less-scientific audience in mind. Complete with minimal illustrations from Lorenz, the book does not read like a scientific experiment that can be precisely duplicated, but more like a series of observations and anecdotes from a man who invited the wild into his home. Unlike King Solomon, Lorenz claims not to need a magic ring to learn the language of animals and to communicate with them. While there are discussions of domesticated and wild dogs, among other animals, Lorenz mainly focuses on the behaviors of the water shrew, his aquarium fish, and the Jackdaw.

While considered a premier examination of animal show more behavior and discussing in detail the phenomenon of imprinting, on some occasions he appears to anthropomorphize these animals, making them seem more human than they are, particularly when discussing their mating rituals. Lorenz also is very descriptive of the animals and their interactions with one another and with the humans who lived in the home and surrounding neighborhood. These descriptions, while interesting to a scientist, may border on tedium for others.

Read the full review:http://savvyverseandwit.com/2012/11/king-solomons-ring-by-konrad-z-lorenz.html show less

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1205617.html

A rather beautiful book about animal communication, based on years of personal observation from the writer's country estate by the river Danube. The story of the water-shrews will linger longest in my memory, but it's all fascinating.

Jackdaws rule.