Running with the Pack

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There’s a view of werewolves (espoused even on the back cover of this volume) as an expression of the animal and the dark in the usually suppressed and mild-mannered civilized person; we like to think of ourselves as beasts, our wild instincts kept in check only by a thin veneer of social necessity. This fantasy is a persistent and appealing one: a jacketed executive by day, but the moment the full moon breaks through the clouds, watch out! There will be claws and fur and blood and howling.

But is this view accurate? I’d like to propose that it is not. In our natural state, humans are large, hairless apes who run well and live in groups. We are not predators—we are prey, something many romantically-minded individuals discover (one assumes, to their chagrin) while trying to survive in the wilderness, communing with nature, and engaging in other solitary pursuits in areas inhabited by large meat-eaters. Wolves and large cats are predators; we are their food.

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