The Insect Epiphany: How Our Six-Legged Allies Shape Human Culture

The Insect Epiphany: How Our Six-Legged Allies Shape Human Culture by Barret Klein

In The Insect Epiphany: How Our Six-Legged Allies Shape Human Culture (2024), Barret Klein explores the impact of insects on human society, an impact both broad and deep. The text is almost always fascinating and offers up more than enough representative examples of his points, while the numerous included illustrations and photographs add a wonderful enhancement to the text.

After a preface which offers a personal touch, and an introduction that gives us some foundational sense of context and numbers (sixty percent of identified animal species are insects, three-quarters of food crops require insect pollination, etc.), the book is divided into three very broad sections: “Working with Them: Symbiosis,” which delves into our use of insect products such as honey, silk, and venom; “Making Them: Genesis,” where we “mechanically mimic” insects, such as in modeling our architecture after theirs; “Becoming Them: Metamorphosis,” which looks at how we currently imitate insect behavior or ways in which it might be a good idea to do so.

As noted, Klein offers up a plethora of fascinating information. Some of it is historical and/or archaeological, such as learning how the secret of making silk made its way out of China or early evidence of beeswax on Viking ships and Egyptian mummies, and why purple was reserved for the top of the class pyramid in ancient Rome. Sometimes the text dives into science and medicine, such as examining the antiseptic, anti-bacterial benefits of honey. But Klein moves beyond the hard factual realms and into art, music, dance, fashion, and behavior as well, a broader exploration than often seen in explorations of the insect world. We even dip into martial arts and fly into space.

Nor does Klein wholly ignore the darker elements of our relationship with and to insects, the millions of silkworms killed for the feel of silk against our skin for instance. And of course our transformative effect on the whole planet environment that has decimated so many species (insects and otherwise). But Klein chooses to close on an optimist note, arguing “a single person can make a difference,” recalling the way children’s eyes “light up” as they relate their own insect encounters to him, and how he can “huddle down in front of the smallest patch of earth and patiently watch … vibrant life.”

That personal touch is liberally sprinkled throughout the text to the book’s benefit. Klein’s voice is engaging and while his language and style are not as lyrical as some nature books, they are always accessible and clear — the two cornerstones of good popular science writing. And again, enough cannot be said about how much the text is enhanced by the visuals, a surprising and uncommon number of them for such a book, at least in my experience. They’re basically worth the price of admission on their own. Well recommended.