Diane Ackerman wants us to slow down and pay attention. Human beings are "creatures stricken by meaning, afflicted with purpose," she laments; that's why it's essential to stop and savor those instants when "time suddenly snags on a simple Wow!" It's easy to live in the moment when you're immersed in Ackerman's glorious prose, studded with arresting phrases and breathtakingly beautiful images…"I love being part of the saga of life on earth," she writes, "and both suffering and change feature large in that adventure." Yet the impressions that linger after closing her book are not of suffering but of joy, not of change, but of the flow of incident halted, over and over, by the masterful hand of an artist who sketches with tender words the small miracles of a vast universe. "Just show up," she urges us. "Presence is always a present, a gift." Her gift to us is the sheer pleasure of seeing the world through her loving eyes.
The Washington Post
In an eye-opening sequence of personal meditations through the cycle of seasons, Diane Ackerman awakens us to the world at dawn-drawing on sources as diverse as meteorology, world religion, etymology, art history, poetry, organic farming, and beekeeping. As a patient and learned observer of animal and human physiology and behavior, she introduces us to varieties of bird music and other signs of avian intelligence, while she herself "migrates" from winter in Florida to spring, summer, and fall in upstate New York.
Humans might luxuriate in the idea of being "in" nature, Ackerman points out, but we often forget that we are nature-for "no facet of nature is as unlikely as we, the tiny bipeds with the giant dreams." Joining science's devotion to detail with religion's appreciation of the sublime, Dawn Light is an impassioned celebration of the miracles of evolution-especially human consciousness of our numbered days on a turning earth.
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Humans might luxuriate in the idea of being "in" nature, Ackerman points out, but we often forget that we are nature-for "no facet of nature is as unlikely as we, the tiny bipeds with the giant dreams." Joining science's devotion to detail with religion's appreciation of the sublime, Dawn Light is an impassioned celebration of the miracles of evolution-especially human consciousness of our numbered days on a turning earth.
Dawn Light: Dancing with Cranes and Other Ways to Start the Day
In an eye-opening sequence of personal meditations through the cycle of seasons, Diane Ackerman awakens us to the world at dawn-drawing on sources as diverse as meteorology, world religion, etymology, art history, poetry, organic farming, and beekeeping. As a patient and learned observer of animal and human physiology and behavior, she introduces us to varieties of bird music and other signs of avian intelligence, while she herself "migrates" from winter in Florida to spring, summer, and fall in upstate New York.
Humans might luxuriate in the idea of being "in" nature, Ackerman points out, but we often forget that we are nature-for "no facet of nature is as unlikely as we, the tiny bipeds with the giant dreams." Joining science's devotion to detail with religion's appreciation of the sublime, Dawn Light is an impassioned celebration of the miracles of evolution-especially human consciousness of our numbered days on a turning earth.
Humans might luxuriate in the idea of being "in" nature, Ackerman points out, but we often forget that we are nature-for "no facet of nature is as unlikely as we, the tiny bipeds with the giant dreams." Joining science's devotion to detail with religion's appreciation of the sublime, Dawn Light is an impassioned celebration of the miracles of evolution-especially human consciousness of our numbered days on a turning earth.
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Product Details
BN ID: | 2940169703306 |
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Publisher: | Tantor Audio |
Publication date: | 10/12/2009 |
Edition description: | Unabridged |
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