American Birds (A Literary Companion)

Featuring some of America's greatest writers and poets, this landmark anthology is both a celebration of the birds around and above us and a field guide to the American soul.

Americans have always watched birds and American writers have captured this keen interest in a variety of genres: poems, journal entries, memoirs, short stories, essays, and travel accounts. Now, in an unprecedented gathering of the very best American writing on birds, editors Terry Tempest Williams and Andrew Rubenfeld pay tribute to native species that range from the Aleutian Islands to the Florida Keys, from the Maine woods to the deserts of the southwest--and to nearby gardens and backyards feeders.

What better companion to a field guide to the birds of North America than these personal accounts of birds and bird watching by a who's who of American writing? Put your binoculars aside and follow Lewis and Clark across the continent, Audubon as he sketches in New Orleans, Emerson and Thoreau rambling around Walden Pond. Join Theodore Roosevelt remembering the birds of his New York childhood, Rachel Carson observing a skimmer on the Atlantic coast, and Roger Tory Peterson looking at snail kites and limpkins in the Everglades. Add to this an impressive array of modern and contemporary poets, all celebrating the wonder of birds and the joys of bird watching. This chronological survey of how and why Americans have watched birds makes the perfect gift for both the serious birder and the backyard birdwatcher.