Philosopher and the Wolf

This fascinating book charts the relationship between Mark Rowlands, a rootless philosopher, and Brenin, his extraordinarily well-travelled wolf. More than just an exotic pet, Brenin exerted an immense influence on Rowlands as both a person, and, strangely enough, as a philosopher, leading him to re-evaluate his attitude to love, happiness, nature and death. By turns funny (what do you do when your wolf eats your air-conditioning unit?) and poignant, this life-affirming classic of popular philosophy will make you reappraise what it means to be human.

This year's most original and instructive work of popular philosophy ... a remarkable portrait of the bond that can exist between a human being and a beast ... [Rowlands is] a rare contemporary philosopher who is able to learn from everything he experiences in life, not just books and academic journals. That is what makes The Philosopher and the Wolf so refreshing, An extraordinary memoir, A powerfully subversive critique of the unexamined assumption that shape the way most philosophers - along with most people - think about animals and themselves, Nothing short of human existence, survival and our relationship to all other creatures is examined here and it's all written in a beautifully elegiac way. The heart-strings will be pulled and the mind stimulated, The Philosopher and the Wolf has been one of the most intense reading experiences of my life. There is hardly a sentence in the book that did not engage me, stop me, make me think. It is a profound and beautiful book

Mark Rowlands was born in Newport, Wales. He is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Miami and the author of sixteen books, including the bestselling The Philosopher and the Wolf. His books have been translated into more than twenty languages.