(Kate McIntyre, Anne Barngrover, Trudy Lewis, Leanna Petronella, and Wendy Oleson)
From the surrealist provocation of Leonora Carrington’s hyena to Marianne Moore’s prickly array of creatures to the minutely observed weasels of Annie Dillard or the strange symbiosis of insect-like aliens and humans in Octavia Butler, women writers have long been probing the intricacies of human-animal relations. Five women writers of fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction discuss the pressing need for more animals on the page in these times of ecological crisis, the role of animals in their own work, and why the inclusion of animal and nonhuman characters in creative works can be viewed as a feminist act.