Abstract
ABSTRACT This article explores the nonhuman and its resistance to meaning-making in two short stories by the Scottish author Eric Linklater (1899–1974). Two bird characters, a gander and plover, destructively affect the lives of the human narrators but resist any attempts at interpretation. This resistance prompts place-holder interpretation strategies, notably symbolic readings. The article argues that although these stories invite such readings, they ultimately discourage them, by signalling unreliability in their character narrators and by the very physical presence of the birds. The resulting ambiguity encourages acceptance of the nonhuman characters’ alterity, which is the stories’ final ethical stance.
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