Literary critters

Animal sidekicks within the vast land of literature often toe the line between accurate depictions of real animals and more fantastical depictions of animals with human qualities. As a sidenote, both below examples are from fantasy series, and both have been turned into movie and television adaptions, but the literary representations are unique in that the reader can determine how to view the relationships between human and animal. 

The Stark children in the doorstopper series A Song of Ice and Fire each have their own pet direwolf – the direwolf is also the sigil of the Stark house. Within this series, the wolves act exactly like one would expect wolves to act and must be domesticated and trained by the children. However, several of the children have been shown throughout the series to be able to communicate with the wolves in special ways, untapping an ancient magical ability to slip into the body of the wolves for short whiles.

DeviantArt user nilaffle's depiction of the Stark children with their direwolves.

In comparison, the three main characters in the Harry Potter novels each have their own pet – an owl, a cat and a rat. In most instances, these animals act like realistic animals. However, it has been hinted at by the author that these animals are magical as well, and as of Prisoner of Azkaban Scabbers the rat is revealed to have been a man in disguise all along. This man, Peter "Wormtail" Pettigrew has taken on particular animalistic qualities, one reason he was able to keep his cowardly disguise for over thirteen years. Like Locke's changelings and monsters, Wormtail is villainous and violent, in tune with his wild nature; his behaviour disgusts and horrifies the other characters.

DeviantArt user beckadoodles' depiction of Harry Potter, Hermione Grainger and Ronald Weasley with their pets.

There are many other countless examples, such as animals depicted in centuries-old fairy tales, or other popular series like the daemons in Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials. These depictions show that animals may be more intelligent than originally thought. The natural distinctions between humans and animals which Bataille emphasizes is blurred, when animals act more like humans and humans act like animals. Animals are merely "like water in water" according to Bataille, but then so are humans - neither are able to remove themselves from the environment completely. But the friendship and companionship between humans and non-humans allow both the characters within the media as well as the reader observing from outside the literary world to reevaluate their own friendly relationship with animals.