This is the same world, Hwang implies, that our own animal desires come from and long for. But we are no longer equipped to live that way. And so, The Hen Who Dreamed She Could Fly is, in its physical brevity and philosophic heft, a note-perfect masterstroke of a novella that captures the contemporary indignation we often accept in tempering our own ambitions, so that we can at least lead undramatic lives.