Man Is The Prey Author:James Clarke *More than 40,000 people are killed each year by snakes. — *2,000 people are eaten yearly by tigers. — *169 people in Germany alone were killed in one recent year by horses, cattle, and pigs; 36,549 were injured that same year by domestic animals. — *Until 1966 more than 50% of all deaths in the Vietnamese War were caused by insects. — Man is very v... more »ulnerable. Without a gun he is no match for animals of the meanest intelligence. Even with his weapons, man loses hundreds of thousands of his numbers every year to inferior species. In "Man Is Prey", James Clarke leads us on an investigation into the actions and motives of the world's man-killers and man-eaters that is at once terrifying and engrossing.
He takes the reader to the middle of the Pacific, where a struggling man bobs up and down in the water as he is devoured by sharks. The reader goes along on the hunt of the Champawat tigress after it had killed and eaten 436 people. He sees a rogue elephant ram a victim into a tree, place a foot on him, and rip off his limbs.
The list of creatures that can either kill or eat man is prodigious. It comprises snakes, crocodiles, lions, wolves, insects, and fish. The author makes it clear, however, that it is man himself - the only capricious killer - who is the real menace.
"Man Is the Prey" vividly recounts the epic duels between man and his natural enemies. It also sets the record straight regarding some species that have been maligned through lack of understanding.
This is a book that is as difficult to turn away from as the sight of a street accident. When the relieved reader finally puts it down, he will agree with the author that only our astounding capacity for reproduction has saved us from annihilation.
James Clarke has lived in Africa since his early twenties. He is the News Editor of "The Star", Johannesburg. His interest in the death-struggle between man and animals has taken him throughout Africa, Europe, and Australasia - anywhere in the world that man is prey.« less