title of this book becomes even more surprising when one learns that the author was a renowned professor of aesthetics at the Sorbonne, a rigorous philosopher who dedicated his life to the study of the artistic work, author even of a famous Vocabulary of aesthetics. That is, someone who takes the word "art" very seriously.
In this book, founded on investigations of behavior and animal psychology, and full of photographs that translate the astonishment of the author, the strict philosopher surrenders to the mysterious evidence that life has scattered everywhere, in all kinds of living beings, the means of artistic creation. The seagull could not ride a stream without an active sensitivity to the shape of the rhythm. The nightingales could not dialogue singing to mark their territories without a spectacular intention. What about the luxury of formal perfection that the potter wasp gives itself, which revises and corrects its work obsessively, without any useful purpose? Dogs could not play, nor could wolves show submission, if they were not able to imitate and pretend.
Souriau clarifies that he has no anthropomorphic intent. But it is good, when observing humans, a bit of zoomorphism. We must break down the prejudice that animals are blind machines and their counterpart, that the human being is an exceptional creature, master of the world and its destiny, and whose highest and purest expression would be art. Finally, the dance of shy teenagers who awkwardly begin courtship shows no greater originality and awareness of beauty than bird courtship dances. And social gatherings between humans do not display much more intelligence than the receptions organized by the pergolero bird after having adorned his home with pebbles and colored feathers.