Gentlemen of the Woods

Do tree societies have second-class citizens just like human societies? It seems they do, though the idea of “class” doesn’t quite fit. It is rather the degree of connection—or maybe even affection—that decides how helpful a tree’s colleagues will be.

As the saying goes, most men live lives of quiet desperation, but these men are demonstrably useless in the modern era. I mean that in a practical sense. Once the average man has been wrung out of his utility to women, he ceases to convince his hindbrain that he can build, improvise or solve things in the future. He loses his utility.

The tradition of men as guardians and protectors had quite died out. These stalwart virgins had no men to fear and therefore no need of protection. As to wild beasts—there were none in their sheltered land.

‘Ze forest is a community,’ she says. ‘Pine talks to oak, oak talks to birch. Birch whispers to crow, who passes it on to grey owl. Deer comes along, hears what’s what from bear. Bear heard it all from mushrooms, whose network goes to root of things. Listen – can you hear it?