A tribute to Frans de Waal: ethologist, author, inspiration
Frans de Waal died last week. I hold no claim to his memory — I never met him, he left this world without ever knowing I was in it — and yet I cried at the kitchen table when I found out in the early hours of a Wisconsin morning.
De Waal changed my life. He wrote Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?, which is the closest thing I have to a bible. He gave me permission to see myself in nonhuman animals — maybe more importantly to see them in me, too. Because of him I am a better dog owner and trainer. Because of him I am more empathetic across species lines. Because of him I am able to fully embrace the magic of the canine-human bond without dissolving into folk nonsense.
Thanks to Frans de Waal I have gotten to be a little kid again — eyes wide with wonder at the creatures who share our world and our possibilities for connection — at the same time I am older than ever before. Confident in my softness. Able to parse studies, at least stiltedly, and push back against masses of internet dog training myths. Capable of seeing the world as it is, I think, and also as it could be… and even the thin line between them. The line I want to be part of.
In my daydreams Frans de Waal was my grandfather. He ignited a passion that long lived in me but needed a fuse. I imagined us sitting in comfortable chairs, warm mugs steaming, him speaking in that measured tone, me soaking up every word. Perhaps he’d smile at the way I applied his broad themes to narrow dog topics. (Perhaps he’d shake his head, but I let myself doubt it.) Perhaps of all people he’d understand what it meant when my sentences quickened and eyes widened and hands flung about, all this enthusiasm bent on finding somewhere to go — all my heart hoping it flows right into the people around me. Lights them up too.
How a person I never met could transform my own journey gives me pause. As does the fact that he will never know. It’s not that he needs to. I’m under no illusion it would have mattered — de Waal connected with so many over his seven decades, what’s one more smile from a stranger. It’s that I never even tried to tell him because despite the tendrils I felt tying us together, I convinced myself he was far away.
I wonder how many other times I’ve stayed inside myself for fear that venturing out is uncouth. We live in a world of parasocial relationships, ample criticism thrown upon their backs. (That skepticism is wise.) And yet.
My heart swells reading de Waal’s many eulogies, hearing the ways he impacted fellow lives. I am awash in the sense that we mourn together — that all our grief is valid, there is no gatekeeping, only soft consideration that we can’t force ourselves into a story we do not own. But we can share our love for that story. We can plot others alongside it.
Here’s to my far-away would-be daydream mentor, and to the strings that connect us — and all our fellow creatures — and to loving people we’ve never met, and to maybe telling them (even if they never hear) that before they leave.
I am sad Frans de Waal is gone. I am thankful he was here.
My favorite things Frans de Waal gave us:
Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are: An engaging and funny and critical and still-relevant-a-decade-after-it-was-published exploration of how we look at nonhuman animals… and why our views have been so wrong. (If you’re one of the many enjoying Ed Yong’s An Immense World in the last year, you’ll love Are We Smart Enough too.)
Permission for critical anthropomorphism.
Mama’s Last Hug: A vital embrace of emotions across species.
(Self-deprecating) humor carrying real challenges about human unfairness.
Age of Empathy: An excellent argument that we, and our brethren, are more than violent brutes who must “fight our nature” to be civilized.
Enthusiasm. So much enthusiasm.