Influential Books

I've been brainstorming for a co-created blog, Books Combined. The request reads as follows:  

Better than anyone, we think authors understand the power of books, and the ways that books can change us, and our perspective on the world. Would you be willing to write around 800 words about the books that have had a significant impact on your life, be it personally, politically, or intellectually? 

Because I just published a book with my co-writer called Monstrous Nature: Environment and Horror on the Big Screen, my first thought was to take a look at the books cited there that most powerfully influenced the work--highlighting a focused intellectual impact on my life.

The list did get pretty long, but I thought I might write about one of them here to see if this focus might work.

Marion Copeland's Cockroach provided a more complex perspective on the insect and its strengths for a chapter on cockroach horror, for example.   Copeland notes multiple positive associations with cockroaches in her book-length Cockroach, as well. Because “of its predilection for the dark” (81), Copeland suggests, the cockroach has become associated with “the unconscious and the power of the id” (81). In Thailand, Australia, South America, and French Guiana, cockroaches serve as food, medicine, and folk tale source. Copeland suggests that studies by anthropologists and explorers reveal that “rather than racking their brains for effective ways to destroy cockroaches, these cultures found the cockroach a useful neighbor, rich in protein and effective for many human diseases. They also seem to have recognized how useful they were to the environment” (81-2). Copeland also notes that cockroaches contribute to cancer research (131).
 
Other studies of cockroaches she highlights emphasize their physical and intellectual strengths by making explicit connections between cockroaches and humans. According to Copeland, “as in humans, female cockroaches have stronger immune responses than males and the very young and very old have weaker responses than mature adults” (131). As early as 1912, studies at Summer Teacher’s College in St. Louis showed that cockroaches could learn to “overcome their innate aversion to light” (135). They were also found capable of running a maze, even without their heads, a feat few animals could grasp (135). 

We can learn from the cockroach, Copeland asserts.   In Cockroach, Copeland even argues, “our survival as a species may depend on discovering a saviour [sic] who looks at us from many-faceted eyes that replace our own myopic human view with the cockroach’s ‘very long view indeed’” (168). I too think we can learn from cockroaches. They're not only "monstrous nature." They're also amazing creatures with skills.