Hares

The Barry Flanagan exhibition at Tate Britain shows his early works - up to 1982, when he was just getting going on the series of hares for which he is so well known - this one, for example -

 They were inspired by this book, which was first published in 1972 -

It's fascinating - not just the natural history, but the hare in mythology - the origins of its association with the moon and with fire, and why hare meat is held in low esteem...

It even has information potentially relevant to my writing/drawing essay topic:

"Auxiliary verbs come late in the development of language and all are derived from words of independent sense. The Egyptian 'to be' was associated with creation and had the sense of being, existing and persisting, which are in mythology often represented by the hare. Myths and picture-writing often use the same symbols.
"A symbol is a sign or object that stands, not exactly, but by association or resemblance, for something else ... as the art of writing develops the picture is adapted and used for abstract ideas."