A WHALE FOR THE KILLING

by Farley Mowat ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 20, 1972

The great aquatic leviathan continues to have a strange allure for Homo sapiens even as he perfects the technology of slaughter which has so catastrophically depleted the great schools of Blues and Finners, Humpbacks and Sperms. Victor Scheffer's The Year of the Whale (1969) won an award, Matthiessen's Blue Meridian (1971) was a best seller and Mowat's A Whale for the Killing may prove just as popular. Back in 1967, Mowat, a lover of rugged Northern communities, bought a home in Burgeo on the Sou'west coast of Newfoundland. There he savored the ""iodine tang of kelp at ebbtide"" and the goodwill of his fisherman neighbors until the arrival of Moby Joe -- an 80 foot Firmer who floundered into a small cove and was quickly trapped by the shallow waters. Moved by the great beast's plight, Mowat launched a furious and desperate campaign to protect his gigantic helpless friend from the bullets of local youngbloods lusting for the kill. Until the animal's escape could be effected (not for a month would the tide be right) it had to be fed; propelled by a rush of fellow-feeling for Moby, Mowat actually managed to persuade some fisherfolk to gather herring for the mammoth. To fend off the snipers he alerted the media and soon Burgeo and its outsized captive were spotlighted across Canada -- with Mowat appointed ""Keeper of the Whale"" by the government. But alas, the fraternal communion between man and beast could not last: pierced by hundreds of bullets the whale sickened and died and Mowat was left to face the wrath and scorn of his neighbors now the unwilling custodians of an enormous, rotting carcass. The story is simply and movingly told, Mowat also filling in the wider details of internationally condoned extermination (for pet food and cosmetics) of ""one of the most highly perfected forms of life ever to dwell upon this planet."" A small but haunting episode in the annals of a dying breed.

Pub Date: Oct. 20, 1972

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Little, Brown -- A.M.P.

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1972

Categories: NONFICTION