Overview

"Why would someone create or own the mounted skin of a dead animal? That's the question Dave Madden explores in ""The Authentic Animal"". He begins with the life story of Carl Akeley, father of modern taxidermy, who started by stuffing a canary and ended with creating the Akeley Hall of African Mammals at The American Museum of Natural History. To get a first-hand glimpse at this world, Madden travels to the World Taxidermy Championships, the garage workplaces of people who mount freeze-dried pets for bereaved owners and the classrooms of a taxidermy academy where students stretch deer pelts over foam bases. On his travels he looks at the forms taxidermy takes - hunting trophies, museum dioramas, roadside novelties, pet memorials - and considers what taxidermy has to tell us about human-animal relationships."

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9781250014726

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<p> Don't let the gory subject matter repel you from this charming account of the cast of kings, artists, biologists, circus performers, and ordinary folks who populate the world of taxidermy. Madden's investigation is marked by appealing candor, literary references, and atmospheric descriptions of (and fondness for) the subculture and its adherents...this book muses with verve and wit on the relationships between human and animal, art and artifact, as well as on the collector's obsession. - Publishers Weekly <p>Madden...investigates the subculture of taxidermy...[and] can be a bit tongue in cheek...when he wonders what would happen if the tables were turned? and the animals put the humans on display... [A] sometimes chilling tour of an intriguing subculture. - Kirkus Reviews

Don't let the gory subject matter repel you from this charming account of the cast of kings, artists, biologists, circus performers, and ordinary folks who populate the world of taxidermy. Madden's investigation is marked by appealing candor, literary references, and atmospheric descriptions of (and fondness for) the subculture and its adherents...this book muses with verve and wit on the relationships between human and animal, art and artifact, as well as on the collector's obsession. - Publishers Weekly Madden...investigates the subculture of taxidermy...[and] can be a bit tongue in cheek...when he wonders what would happen if the tables were turned? and the animals put the humans on display... [A] sometimes chilling tour of an intriguing subculture. - Kirkus Reviews

Author Information

DAVE MADDEN is a professor at The University of Alabama. He lives in Tuscaloosa and co-edits The Cupboard, a quarterly pamphlet. The Authentic Animal is his first book.

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