The Running Sky
A Bird-Watching Life
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Vintage Publishing
Published:3rd Jun '10
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
An extraordinary, inspiring book about a lifetime of observing birds, already acclaimed as a classic.
The Running Sky records a lifetime of looking at birds. Begining in summer with clouds of breeding seabirds in Shetland and ending with crepuscular nightjars like giant moths in the heart of England, Tim Dee maps his own observations and encounters over four decades of tracking birds across the globe.The Running Sky records a lifetime of looking at birds. Begining in summer with clouds of breeding seabirds in Shetland and ending with crepuscular nightjars like giant moths in the heart of England, Tim Dee maps his own observations and encounters over four decades of tracking birds across the globe. He tells of near-global birds like sparrows, starlings and ravens, and exotic species, like electrically coloured hummingbirds in California and bee-eaters and broadbills in Africa. In doing so he brilliantly restores us to the primacy of looking, the thrill of watching, and takes us outside, again and again, to stand - with or without binoculars - under the storm of life over our heads, and to marvel once more at what is flying about us.
The Running Sky has the makings of a classic. It's beautifully written, extraordinarily vigilant, and very moving...as we read it, we learn a lot about ourselves as well as the fellow creatures flying through, over and around our own lives -- Andrew Motion
Its author has a forensic eye for detail and a gift for poetry...an intimate and erudite account... he is in the front rank of contributors to the literature of natural history * Daily Telegraph *
Serious and playful...creates a powerful and intensely poetic paean to what others have called the wonder of birds * Guardian *
A beautifully haunting and involving memoir. The writer's passion for birds becomes his way of expressing his whole relationship to landscape and history and family: unsentimental and urgently contemporary -- Tessa Hadley
Dee's extraordinary, beautifully written account of a life spent watching birds is a fine addition to the flourishing genre of British nature writing * Sunday Times *
Lyrical...sure to become a genuine addition to the literature of birds * Daily Express *
What makes his book wonderful is his passion... He captures the thrill and puzzlement of watching birds as I have never previously seen it captured * Sunday Herald *
Thrillingly original memoir ... extraordinary -- Lynn Barber * The Sunday Times *
To write a book about a year's bird-watching as keenly observed as this, you have to be dedicated to the point of obsession; to write one as transcendent, you must be a poet -- Christopher Somerville * The Times, Christmas Books *
As unexpected as it is brilliant... A moving, powerful meditation on the natural world that envelops us, even in the heart of our cities -- Helen Dunmore * Guardian Summer Reading *
ISBN: 9780099516491
Dimensions: 198mm x 129mm x 17mm
Weight: 191g
272 pages