Susan Orlean: On Animals

Celebrated writer Susan Orlean visits The Commonwealth Club for the first time to discuss her new book, On Animals, a collection from her lifetime of musings, mediations and in-depth profiles about animals.

Orlean, a staff writer for The New Yorker, is fresh off her last best-selling book, The Library Book, about the Los Angeles Public Library, which won numerous awards. Her new collection focuses on a range of creatures—the household pets we dote on, the animals we raise to end up as meat on our plates, the creatures who could eat us for dinner, and the various tamed and untamed animals we share our planet with that are central to human life. Since the age of six, Orlean has been fascinated by stories about animals, and her new book brings forward a lifetime of writing about cross-species connections.

How humans interact with animals has preoccupied philosophers, poets and naturalists for ages. Come hear one of America's most gifted writers discuss why she is so passionate and curious about the subject.