On Wednesday night, the Lowell Humanities Series at Boston College welcomed a storyteller who has danced with octopi and been chased by silverback gorillas.
Sy Montgomery, whose pen has chronicled the consciousness of creatures across 34 books, brought her characteristic vivacity to an evening that transformed scientific observation into poetry at Gasson Hall.
Montgomery, who makes her home in New Hampshire when not traversing the globe’s wild places, spoke with the enthusiasm of someone who has found life’s sweet spot—that rare intersection of passion and purpose.
“As soon as I would apprentice myself to a new animal, it would open up new worlds,” Montgomery said, her eyes bright with the memories of countless such apprenticeships.
Her journey began with an unconventional courtship with emus in Australia, a six-month endeavor that convinced her that office life would never satisfy her soul.
Following in the footsteps of her heroes Jane Goodall and Julia Badescu, Montgomery embraced a methodology that braids together scientific rigor with emotional intelligence, allowing animals to be both subjects and teachers.
But it was her encounter with Athena, a 40-pound octopus at the New England Aquarium, that perhaps best illustrates Montgomery’s unique approach to interspecies connection.
On a bitter March morning in 2011, she stood before a creature whose lineage diverged from humans’ half a billion years ago, when life was little more than animated tubes in ancient seas.
Athena, Montgomery recalled with evident joy, reached out with her 4-foot arms in a gesture that was part embrace, part exploration. The octopus’ skin flickered from red excitement to white serenity as she allowed Montgomery—a privilege typically reserved for aquarium staff—to stroke her head.
Later, another octopus, named Octavia, would further expand Montgomery’s understanding of these sophisticated invertebrates. Their play sessions with LEGOs and Mr. Potato Head toys revealed an intelligence that defied conventional measures.
“It was wonderful to be able to commune with this creature so unlike myself,” Montgomery said.
These experiences informed Montgomery’s latest book, Secrets of the Octopus, which accompanies National Geographic’s 2024 miniseries titled Secrets of the Octopus. But more than that, they exemplify her larger mission: to illuminate the complex consciousness of creatures we too often oversimplify. Whether learning from a portly pig about the true nature of family or discovering the medicinal wisdom of bears, Montgomery approaches each encounter with what she calls “a beginner’s mind.”
As the evening drew to a close, Montgomery left her audience with a transformed vision of the natural world—one where intelligence wears many forms, and where the divide between human and animal consciousness dissolves in the waters of mutual curiosity.
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