“She used to collect everything, catalog everything, explain to him
everything, examine with the pocket magnifying glass he’d given her
every chameleonlike crab spider that she brought home to hold briefly
captive in a moistened mason jar, feeding it on dead houseflies until
she released it back onto the golden rod or the Queen Anne’s lace
(‘Watch what happens now, Dad’) Where it resumed adjusting its color to
ambish its prey.”

—Philip Roth, American Pastoral, 1997.