A friend told me the other day that the last book about animals he had read was "Animal Farm," his sneer implying that animal books are best reserved for readers at the Peter Rabbit level of literacy. For those who think they agree (on alternate Tuesdays, I agree, having never recovered from once reading books for a publisher who sponsored an annual animal book award), let me quickly say that Edward Hoagland's essays are never wholly about animals, though some contain a lot of wildlife lore, but are often about Hoagland's attempts "to rediscover the commonality of animal and man." By losing our awareness of animals, he writes, "we sacrifice some of the intricacy and grandeur of life." Bears and wolves, the subjects of the two longest essays in ["Red Wolves and Black Bears"], particularly delight him because in these large predators he finds resemblances to man—our...