My
much-read, greatly-treasured original copy of the Paladin 1972 abridged paperback
reprint of On the Track of Unknown Animals (© Paladin/Dr Karl Shuker)
Today is my birthday,
the first one that I have ever known without any family since the passing away
of my dear mother, Mary Shuker, exactly 36 weeks ago on Easter Monday.
Yet on this poignant
day of reflection and remembrance for me, I still fondly recall a birthday
present bought for me by Mom a very long time ago but which changed my life forever,
literally…
As a zoologist,
media consultant, and author specialising in cryptozoology, it is supremely
ironic that my introduction to this enthralling subject was anything but promising.
It all began one day during the early 1970s when,
aged around 13, I walked into the department store Boots in the town of Walsall
in the West Midlands, England, and spotted a copy of the Paladin abridged paperback
edition (1972 reprint) of Dr Bernard Heuvelmans's classic book On the Track of Unknown Animals. Picking
it up, I opened it at random, and my eyes alighted upon the following sentence,
on p. 199, concerning a South American subterranean cryptid called the minhocão:
"Senhor
Lebino also related that in the same district, a Negro woman, who was going one
morning to draw water, found the pool destroyed and saw an animal 'as big as a
house' crawling away on the ground."
"An animal as big as a house! How
ridiculous!", I thought to myself, and promptly replaced the offending
book on the shelf.
That hasty action could well have ended my
cryptozoological career before it had even begun, cruelly stifled at birth.
Happily, however, Fate decreed otherwise. My mother, who was with me, had seen
that I had been reading this particular book, albeit briefly, so while I was looking elsewhere in Boots she secretly purchased it as a surprise birthday present for me in December of that same
year. When I opened the parcel and saw which book was inside, I remembered what
I had read before, and viewed it with suspicion, but as soon as I began reading
it properly, from the beginning, I was of course totally hooked. In no time, I
had read it from cover to cover on so many occasions that I could virtually recite great
chunks of it.
Eager to learn more about undiscovered animals, I
began collecting every newspaper cutting, magazine article, and book that I
could find on the subject. And when, while studying zoology at university, I
became friends with a fellow student who actually owned the unabridged 1958 hardback
edition of On the Track...,
containing several short chapters that had been omitted from my abridged
paperback version, and who kindly permitted me to take his book to the nearest
photocopier, I felt as euphoric as if I had been handed the Holy Grail!
My copy of the original 1958 hardback
English edition, which I finally purchased more than a decade after
receiving the paperback edition from Mom as a birthday present (© Rupert
Hart-Davis)
How I wished then that I could make a career out of
cryptozoology, but, like most zoology students starting university, I
anticipated pursuing a traditional professional life as a research scientist.
And indeed, I went on to obtain both a BSc
(Honours) degree in pure zoology and also a PhD in zoology and comparative
physiology. However, I had always enjoyed writing, and during my spare time I
had by now also amassed a formidable private archive of cryptozoological
material. So instead of continuing with mainstream zoological research
following my PhD, I decided instead to plunge into the uncertain waters of
freelance journalism - specialising in cryptozoology and other areas of
so-called 'fringe' science.
My copy of the original two-volume
French edition of On the Track of Unknown Animals, entitled Sur la
Piste des Bêtes Ignorées and published in 1955 (© Librairie Plon)
Some of my early cryptozoological friends and
colleagues outside Britain jokingly said that I seemed to spring up from
nowhere, and I can appreciate that this may well have been how it looked to
them. However, I can assure everyone that, in the time-honoured showbusiness
tradition with such matters, it took me quite a long time to become an
overnight success!
It began with a number of articles and letters of
mine published in various British newspapers, and regular cryptozoological
commissions from a British magazine (sadly now defunct) called The Unknown. Following this, I
experienced my first success abroad, with a selection of articles accepted for
publication in Fate by its then
editor, Jerome Clark. My long-running 'Alien Zoo' column in Fortean Times
began soon afterwards (and still appears today), as well as regular articles in
many other magazines too.
My copy of the four-volume, revised
and corrected 1982 edition of Sur la Piste des Bêtes Ignorées (© Famot)
In 1987, I was amazed and ecstatic when my very
first book synopsis, proposing an international survey of feline cryptids, was
swiftly accepted by a well-respected London publishing firm, Robert Hale. Even before the ink
was dry on its contract, I had already begun writing the book, which was
published in June 1989 as Mystery Cats of
the World - achieving great success, staying in print for several years,
and bringing my name to widespread attention at last. Two years later saw the
publication of a second book of mine by Robert Hale - Extraordinary Animals Worldwide, reviewing a diverse range of
animal anomalies.
I had also been researching and preparing another
book for quite a long time (although initially only as a hobby), on a subject
that had never been covered in book form before - new and rediscovered animals
of the 20th Century. In 1993, however, five years of exhaustive work on this
pioneering project climaxed with its publication by HarperCollins, as The Lost Ark - which I successively updated in
subsequent years to yield two fully-revised, much-expanded sequels – The New
Zoo (2002), and The Encyclopaedia of New and Rediscovered Animals
(2012).
My copy of the revised 1995 edition
of On the Track of Unknown Animals (© Kegan Paul International)
Twenty years have somehow raced by almost unseen
and unrealised by me since the publication of The Lost Ark, and the
current tally of books written by me stands at 20, plus another 12 for which I
have acted as consultant and/or contributor, as well as countless articles and blog posts, and my continuing editorship of the Journal of Cryptozoology
(click here and here for a complete listing of
my books and those for which I have acted as consultant/contributor).
And they all owe their existence to that unassuming
birthday present bought for me by Mom all those years ago. Today, it is
battered, tattered, stapled, and sellotaped together to within an inch of its
life, almost read into oblivion by me over the years. Indeed, I eventually
purchased a second, near-pristine copy for my cryptozoological bookshelves in
my study. But my original copy remains one of my most treasured possessions, safely
housed within a bookcase in my bedroom alongside other much-loved books from my
childhood and early teenage years.
Holding two books that influenced me
greatly during my formative years, both of them bought for me by Mom (© Dr Karl
Shuker)
Thank you, little Mom, for being my rock, the
foundation upon which I have built my entire life, and, by giving me this humble
little book as a birthday present over 40 years ago, propelling me along a
hitherto-unsuspected but inspirational path - opening my eyes to the fascinating
world of mystery animals that led to my lifelong career in cryptozoological
writing and research, and which in turn has given me so much happiness and
engaged my continuing interest for such a very long time.
How I wish that you were here today, to wish me a
happy birthday and to give me a birthday card like you've always done every
year of my life. You often joked that I'm an incorrigible hoarder, but
occasionally it can be of great benefit, and today was one such occasion. I've hoarded
quite a few of the birthday and Christmas cards that we've sent to each other
over the years, so today I found some birthday cards that you'd written and
given to me in earlier years, and I've put a couple of them up on the mantelpiece
here, where I always placed yours in previous times.
The wonderful birthday card that Mom gave to me on my 11th birthday in 1970 - knowing that I liked cats and that my favourite colour was blue, she knew how much I'd love this card, and I've treasured it ever since - thanks Mom (© Dr Karl Shuker)
So even though you can't be here with me today, I
still have a birthday card from you – two, in fact – to look at and remind me with
great joy and thankfulness of when you were here, of all the many happy birthdays
that we spent together down through the years, and how very lucky and truly blessed
my life has been with you in it as my mother.
Mom and a giant ground sloth statue
at Crystal Palace, 2010 (© Dr Karl Shuker)
Posts
