Paper Tiger

Paper Tiger: How Pictures Shaped the Thylacine. Forty South Publishing, 2014. 

This is a history of the thylacine or Tasmanian ‘tiger’ that draws us closer to the animals who served as models for illustrations. It takes the reader on a journey behind artists’ brushstrokes and photographers’ lenses into the world of science, printing processes, publishing entrepreneurs, circulating libraries and bounties and reveals how inaccurate published images were . . . and how profoundly they affected attitudes toward the few remaining members of the species.

Written with sensitivity and an eye for detail, Paper Tiger uncovers forgotten drawings and lost photographs from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, telling a story full of mystery and revelations. It demonstrates how pictures and words have a vital influence on a species’ survival. As the rate of extinctions escalates, we are also reminded that sympathetic pictures have the power to provide hope for endangered animals.

Paper Tiger is a compelling book for anyone interested in history and images, or concerned about the natural environment, animal extinctions and conservation issues. It also provides a visual resource for art gallery and museum curators, print collectors and zoologists

ISBN 978 0 9922791 xx
August 2014

Paper Tiger: A Visual History of the Thylacine. First edition. Brill Academic Publishers, 2010.

This edition of Paper Tiger in Brill’s Human-Animal Studies Series was aimed at human-animal studies scholars, zoologists, conservationists and cultural historians. It contained 80 illustrations and was published as a soft cover book that was marketed to university and institutional libraries, mainly in Europe and USA. It is now out of print, but available as an Ebook on Brill’s website.

The 2014 revised edition of Paper Tiger above, with the subtitle How Pictures Shaped the Thylacine, has a revised text, completely new layout and cover design and 20 additional illustrations. It is aimed at a general, educated audience and is available at an affordable price.

Reviews

“This book is a remarkable achievement. Freeman tells the story of the thylacine in an original and deeply affecting way. We learn about the animals … and the ravaging impact that human ideas had upon them. Freeman writes thoughtfully, carefully, and with force, and the book is a very good read”

Nigel Rothfels
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, author of Savages and Beasts: The Birth of the Modern Zoo.

“In the sad history of human-made extinctions in Australia, few surpass that of the thylacine. Paper Tiger traces the genealogy of each thylacine image with painstaking care. The result is a compelling history of that species, of extinction and of natural history illustrations. This book is a fine contribution to, and crucial reference for, cultural history, animal studies and the history of the book. Putting to one side for the moment recent reported sightings of thylacines, all that is now left to us of these animals are tainted images and pickled bodies. Carol Freeman has enriched both our understanding of what we have lost, and how this was accomplished”. Island Magazine

Helen MacDonald
Senior Fellow at The Australian Centre in the School of Historical Studies at the University of Melbourne and author of Human Remains: Dissection and its Histories, winner of the Victorian Premier’s Literary Prize (History). In Island.

“This book provides a scholarly yet very readable account of a very great loss, the extinction of the Thylacine … and has what it takes to become a classic text. Freeman’s study makes a valuable and timely contribution to the question of how we are going to come to terms with our role in the burgeoning global problem of mass species extinctions”

Linda Williams
Associate Professor in Art, Environment and Cultural Studies at RMIT University Melbourne. In Philosophy, Activism, Nature.

“As an animal lover, I found Paper Tiger one of the saddest books I’ve read. I had mistakenly thought that the Thylacine’s extinction was a tragic accident, when in fact it was a malicious thing, a result of deliberate efforts bent on its extermination. I commend Carol Freeman for making this a readable book when many scholarly works in Human-Animal Studies are not. Her language is straightforward and unpretentious. By avoiding the rhetoric of advocacy she constructs a more powerful indictment against the forces that contributed to this magnificent animal’s demise.”

Jonathan Balcombe
Author of Second Nature: The Inner Lives of Animals and The Exultant Ark: A Pictorial Tour of Animal Pleasure. In Psychology Today.