This is Daniel Quinn’s top selling book written in the 70s (I believe). The book is a conversation between a gorilla and an intellectual. They talk about society and all the other sub topics that surround it - one may find economic, political, individuality, and religious truths throughout the “story”. The gorilla enlightens us as we are captivated by the intellectual who has an “earnest desire to save the world”. Daniel Quinn himself has called it a spiritual adventure and offers us another interpretation of the state of affairs.

Here are some ideas based off of this book:

1. Life feeds on life; diversity sustains life for all living organisms.
2. Agricultural societies and how they have ‘taken over the world’.
3. How “Mother Culture” tells us our history and what main philosophy has come out of it.
4. The life of communal societies, such as Native Americans, and how they preserved individuality amongst a collective.
5. The economics of agricultural society as opposed to hunter-and-gatherer societies.

There are many other ideas in this book, and in between these enlightening moments are inquiries and a thought process. The intellectual learns more about himself, the world, and the forces that are destructive in our planet.

The ending doesn’t tell the reader what to do in order to “save the world”. At the end of the book, the gorilla dies of hypothermia and so the intellectual is left in the dust with a few keepsakes from his cage. However disappointing the ending is to some, the book still offers any reader with a way to frame things through the stories of the “taker societies” (agricultural societies) and the “leaver societies” (other societies). The taker society assumes god-power and tries to run the world, shaping it to its needs; the leaver society leaves nature to run its course and lives in accordance to its bounty. You can read more about this discourse between the two…

Stylistically, the book is an easy read. Hope you will enjoy it!

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