6/29/2023 0 Comments Our family and other animalsIt was the making of Gerald – Gerry in the book, the youngest of four, mad for wildlife and agog for all other kinds of life as well – and the book makes that abundantly clear. They left England on this mad jaunt ‘like a flock of migrating swallows’ and had what really was the time of their lives. It’s an account of five years that Durrell and his family spent on the Greek island of Corfu, departing in 1939 just ahead of the war. It is just politely euthanized, a beloved family pet tactfully and efficiently put down by a trusted vet. It finishes with a brief, almost apologetic admission that all such things come to an end – but in truth the book doesn’t really end at all. My Family and Other Animals is a tale of uninterrupted delight. Most evocations of paradise dwell on the eventual loss: not here. But for five miraculous years and 120,000 miraculous words Gerald Durrell sustained a vision of paradise with joy in every day and every page. Loss is the diagnostic feature of every paradise ever lived or imagined.
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