“Interspecies Empathy and Canine Captivity in Karen Russell’s Short Fiction”

Abstract

ABSTRACT This essay examines the contributions of American short story writer Karen Russell to debates in Critical Animal Studies and philosophy about the ethics of animal domestication. Russell’s fabulist stories have often been interpreted through a speciesist lens, ignoring her representation of nonhuman animal consciousness. Although humanist critics have interpreted Russell’s animal subjects as allegories for systems of human oppression, I read her work as a critique of anthropocentrism and human exceptionalism. I analyze “St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves” and “Madame Bovary’s Greyhound,” two stories that focus on the oldest domesticated animal species and the one that remains the most entangled with humanity – the domesticated dog, a descendent of the wild wolf. Featuring female protagonists who are dogs or wolf/human hybrids, these stories engage with ecofeminist and posthumanist arguments about the intersectionality of animal subjugation and the exploitation of women and disempowered racial groups. Echoing recent scientific studies of canine cognition and behavior, Karen Russell’s stories represent dogs as a domesticated species whose animal instincts have been routinely thwarted. While most people consider dogs to be a fortunate species, Russell’s canine stories defamiliarize the relationship between humans and dogs to invite cross-species empathy and ethical reflection about pet-keeping practices.