“Gus: There are still bears out here. Black bears who feel no kinship to black men.”

“A bear! A bear! All black and brown and covered in hair!”

“The Bear and the Maiden FairA bear there was, a bear, a bear!All black and brown, and covered with hair!The bear! The bear!Oh, come, they said, oh come to the fair!The fair? Said he, but I'm a bear!All black, and brown, and covered with hair!And Down the road from here to there.From here! To There!Three boys, a goat, and a dancing bear![He] danced and spun, all the way to the Fair!The Fair! The Fair![...]Oh, sweet she was, and pure, and fair!The maid with honey in her hair!Her hair! Her hair!The maid with honey in her hair![The bear,] smelled the scent on the summer air.The bear! The bear!All black and brown and covered with hair.He smelled the scent on the summer air!He sniffed and roared and smelled it there!Honey on the summer air!Oh, I'm a maid, and I'm pure and fair!I'll never dance with a hairy bear!A bear! A bear!I'll never dance with a hairy bear!He lifted her high into the air!The bear! The bear!I called for a knight, but you're a bear!A bear! A bear!All black and brown and covered with hair!She kicked and wailed, the maid so fair,But he licked the honey from her hair,Her hair! Her hair!Then she sighed and squealed and kicked the air!My bear! She sang. My bear so fair!And off they went, from here to there,The bear, the bear, and the maiden fair.~"The Bear and the Maiden Fair",”

“Black bears rarely attack. But here's the thing. Sometimes they do. All bears are agile, cunning and immensely strong, and they are always hungry. If they want to kill you and eat you, they can, and pretty much whenever they want. That doesn't happen often, but - and here is the absolutely salient point - once would be enough.”

“People wanted security. They couldn't bear the idea of death being a black nothing, couldn't bear the thought of their loved ones not existing, and couldn't imagine themselves not existing.”

“Further north, I met a Siberian hermit who lived in the foothills of the Ural Mountains. His life’s passion was wrestling black bears ... in the nude (him not the bears). He did not know why he did it. All the hermit knew was that if he stopped wrestling bears, he would die.”