The Emperor's Embrace: Reflections On Animal Families And Fatherhood

The Emperor’s Embrace is quite simply the seminal and definitive guide to animal fatherhood. Masson is the author of two previous books about the behavior and emotional lives of animals, When Elephants Weep and Dogs Never Lie About Love, and in this book he turns his lens to the often ignored area of animal fathers. In addition to surveying the behavior of fathers throughout the animal kingdom, Masson offers many meditations on how we interpret animal behavior as well as colorful vignettes that illustrate the astonishing range of parenting by animal fathers.

Masson opens with a chapter devoted primarily to the Emperor Penguin, whose amazing feats of fatherhood have by now been popularized in films and books, some of which have been show more reviewed on this site. This introductory chapter is nevertheless fascinating for Masson’s discussion of the history and methods of how humans came to understand penguin behavior, which frames the many other examples of the behavior of animal fathers that he gives throughout the book. These are fascinating in part because they portray acts of extraordinary parental devotion by fathers in areas that are commonly assumed to be the exclusive domain of females, such as the male tamarind monkey who assists the female during birth or the male rhea(a relative of the ostrich) who incubates the eggs and then raises the chicks alone. But they are also intriguing for the sheer breadth of exceptional animal fathers across the animal kingdom, including not only mammals such as beavers and prairie dogs but also numerous birds, fish and even amphibians. There are also chapters that explore issues such as monogamy and pair-bonding, establishing paternity, bad animal fathers, and why paternal care is more common among egg-laying species than among mammals.

Throughout, Masson attempts to illuminate not only the behavior and biology of animal fathers but also their emotional lives as well, and makes a strong case that far more than instinct is at work when a father cares for his offspring. Engrossing and often surprising, The Emperor’s Embrace puts the lie to the idea that mothers are inherently more suited to care for children than fathers due to some kind of biological destiny, and will make any man proud to count himself part of a fraternity of fatherhood that extends not only to other humans but to our animal cousins as well. Review by Book Dads show less

The animals are just like little people. Or rather, people are much like the animals. Though it doesn't always feel very scientific, he does posit a respectable refutation of the common tenet that the male of most species is extremely protective of their certainty of paternity. The author also conveys the full variety of parenting styles across the advanced orders of animals. It's not just pigeons and ducks that are monogamous -- most birds are. The chapters about penguins, wolves, and prairie dogs were particularly interesting. In the epilogue, he launches out with a few strong assertions about human parenting (the common bed, 3 years of breastfeeding, etc), but I am not convinced that we haven't come far enough from our anthropologic show more roots to change accordingly. Also memorable is his description of the method penguins use to check the water for arctic seals: they push one of their group in. show less

animal behavior has been fascinating to me recently, so i was very interested in the premise of this book. i was very disappointed. the book was very poorly organized. unorganized writing usually doesn't bother me too much, but this was such a random collection of stories about animals that i had a hard time understanding what he was getting at. i like what he has to say about the role of human fathers, but nothing he said about non-human fathers did anything to support his ideas about human fathering. he made a lot of statements about animals falling in love, feeling sad, making choices, etc. that i don't necissarily disagree with, but the way he presented them seemed out of place and unconvincing. i'm not sure why i gave the book two show more stars instead of one. there was some interesting information about animal behavior, and i guess i just appreciate the fact that the author it trying to get a better grasp on fatherhood. show less

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"While it still has some interesting bit of information to impart, I found myself a bit listless and bored as the chapters went on. Like, the author would talk about one species, then name another as a contrast, and the whole thing was completely lost on me because I have no idea what either of the animals looked like, what they do, what I'm supposed to think about them. This book would have benefited greatly from a color insert with photos (maybe it had one, but I was reading an advance copy)."