Download or read book Pilgrims of the Air The Passing of the Passenger Pigeons written by John Wilson Foster and published by New York Review of Books. This book was released on 2017-10-10 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a story of a scarcely credible abundance, of flocks of birds so vast they made the sky invisible. It is also a story of a collapse into extinction so startling as to provoke a mystery. In the fate of the North American passenger pigeon we can read much of the story of wild America—the astonishment that accompanied its discovery, the allure of its natural “productions” the ruthless exploitation of its “commodities” and the ultimate betrayal of its peculiar genius. And in the bird’s fate can be read, too, the essential vulnerability of species, the unpredictable passage of life itself.
Download or read book In a Harbour Green written by George O’Brien and published by Merrion Press. This book was released on 2019-07-29 with total page 148 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Novelist, short-story writer, critic, memoirist, broadcaster and journalist: Benedict Kiely (1919–2007) was not only one of the best known but one of the most artistically and culturally distinctive men of letters of his day. His fascination with the island of Ireland, the myths and memories of its people, and the many-voiced quality of its traditions, has secured for him a unique place in the country’s literary history. His substantial body of fiction and non-fiction is a repository of lore and learning, and amply rewards not only the interest shown in it over many years by his popularity among the general public, but also that of Irish and international literary scholarship. Strangely, however, despite his renowned reputation and canonical status, Kiely remains a writer whose work has generated surprisingly little secondary literature, academic or otherwise. This charming collection of twelve essays by some of Ireland’s foremost writers and esteemed international critics, in this, his centenary year, will breathe new life into Kiely’s work and place him back where he belongs, at the heart of Irish literature.
Download or read book Chambers s Journal written by and published by . This book was released on 1905 with total page 898 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Passenger Pigeon written by Errol Fuller and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2014-09-15 with total page 182 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A haunting, beautifully illustrated memorial to this iconic extinct bird At the start of the nineteenth century, Passenger Pigeons were perhaps the most abundant birds on the planet, numbering literally in the billions. The flocks were so large and so dense that they blackened the skies, even blotting out the sun for days at a stretch. Yet by the end of the century, the most common bird in North America had vanished from the wild. In 1914, the last known representative of her species, Martha, died in a cage at the Cincinnati Zoo. This stunningly illustrated book tells the astonishing story of North America's Passenger Pigeon, a bird species that—like the Tyrannosaur, the Mammoth, and the Dodo—has become one of the great icons of extinction. Errol Fuller describes how these fast, agile, and handsomely plumaged birds were immortalized by the ornithologist and painter John James Audubon, and captured the imagination of writers such as James Fenimore Cooper, Henry David Thoreau, and Mark Twain. He shows how widespread deforestation, the demand for cheap and plentiful pigeon meat, and the indiscriminate killing of Passenger Pigeons for sport led to their catastrophic decline. Fuller provides an evocative memorial to a bird species that was once so important to the ecology of North America, and reminds us of just how fragile the natural world can be. Published in the centennial year of Martha’s death, The Passenger Pigeon features rare archival images as well as haunting photos of live birds.
Download or read book Chambers s Edinburgh Journal written by and published by . This book was released on 1905 with total page 906 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Chambers s Journal of Popular Literature Science and Arts written by and published by . This book was released on 1833 with total page 426 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Passenger Pigeon written by John Audubon and published by American Roots. This book was released on 2015 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "'The Passenger Pigeon' is from Ornithological Biography by John James Audubon. It was first published in 1831."--t.p. verso.
Download or read book A Feathered River Across the Sky written by Joel Greenberg and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2014-01-30 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The epic story of why passenger pigeons became extinct and what that says about our current relationship with the natural world. When Europeans arrived in North America, 25 to 40 percent of the continent's birds were passenger pigeons, traveling in flocks so massive as to block out the sun for hours or even days. The downbeats of their wings would chill the air beneath and create a thundering roar that would drown out all other sound. John James Audubon, impressed by their speed and agility, said a lone passenger pigeon streaking through the forest “passes like a thought.” How prophetic-for although a billion pigeons crossed the skies 80 miles from Toronto in May of 1860, little more than fifty years later passenger pigeons were extinct. The last of the species, Martha, died in captivity at the Cincinnati Zoo on September 1, 1914. As naturalist Joel Greenberg relates in gripping detail, the pigeons' propensity to nest, roost, and fly together in vast numbers made them vulnerable to unremitting market and recreational hunting. The spread of railroads and telegraph lines created national demand that allowed the birds to be pursued relentlessly. Passenger pigeons inspired awe in the likes of Audubon, Henry David Thoreau, James Fenimore Cooper, and others, but no serious effort was made to protect the species until it was too late. Greenberg's beautifully written story of the passenger pigeon paints a vivid picture of the passenger pigeon's place in literature, art, and the hearts and minds of those who witnessed this epic bird, while providing a cautionary tale of what happens when species and natural resources are not harvested sustainably.
Download or read book Technological Nature written by Peter H. Kahn, Jr. and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2011-02-25 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why it matters that our relationship with nature is increasingly mediated and augmented by technology. Our forebears may have had a close connection with the natural world, but increasingly we experience technological nature. Children come of age watching digital nature programs on television. They inhabit virtual lands in digital games. And they play with robotic animals, purchased at big box stores. Until a few years ago, hunters could "telehunt"—shoot and kill animals in Texas from a computer anywhere in the world via a Web interface. Does it matter that much of our experience with nature is mediated and augmented by technology? In Technological Nature, Peter Kahn argues that it does, and shows how it affects our well-being. Kahn describes his investigations of children's and adults' experiences of cutting-edge technological nature. He and his team installed "technological nature windows" (50-inch plasma screens showing high-definition broadcasts of real-time local nature views) in inside offices on his university campus and assessed the physiological and psychological effects on viewers. He studied children's and adults' relationships with the robotic dog AIBO (including possible benefits for children with autism). And he studied online "telegardening" (a pastoral alternative to "telehunting"). Kahn's studies show that in terms of human well-being technological nature is better than no nature, but not as good as actual nature. We should develop and use technological nature as a bonus on life, not as its substitute, and re-envision what is beautiful and fulfilling and often wild in essence in our relationship with the natural world.
Download or read book The Idea of the Union written by John Wilson Foster and published by . This book was released on 1995 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Studer s Popular Ornithology written by Jacob H. Studer and published by . This book was released on 1878 with total page 668 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book When God Was a Bird written by Mark I. Wallace and published by Fordham Univ Press. This book was released on 2018-11-20 with total page 196 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 2019 NAUTILUS GOLD WINNER In a time of rapid climate change and species extinction, what role have the world’s religions played in ameliorating—or causing—the crisis we now face? Religion in general, and Christianity in particular, appears to bear a disproportionate burden for creating humankind’s exploitative attitudes toward nature through unearthly theologies that divorce human beings and their spiritual yearnings from their natural origins. In this regard, Christianity has become an otherworldly religion that views the natural world as “fallen,” as empty of signs of God’s presence. And yet, buried deep within the Christian tradition are startling portrayals of God as the beaked and feathered Holy Spirit – the “animal God,” as it were, of historic Christian witness. Through biblical readings, historical theology, continental philosophy, and personal stories of sacred nature, this book recovers the model of God in Christianity as a creaturely, avian being who signals the presence of spirit in everything, human and more-than-human alike. Mark Wallace’s recovery of the bird-God of the Bible signals a deep grounding of faith in the natural world. The moral implications of nature-based Christianity are profound. All life is deserving of humans’ care and protection insofar as the world is envisioned as alive with sacred animals, plants, and landscapes. From the perspective of Christian animism, the Earth is the holy place that God made and that humankind is enjoined to watch over and cherish in like manner. Saving the environment, then, is not a political issue on the left or the right of the ideological spectrum, but, rather, an innermost passion shared by all people of faith and good will in a world damaged by anthropogenic warming, massive species extinction, and the loss of arable land, potable water, and breathable air. To Wallace, this passion is inviolable and flows directly from the heart of Christian teaching that God is a carnal, fleshy reality who is promiscuously incarnated within all things, making the whole world a sacred embodiment of God’s presence, and worthy of our affectionate concern. This beautifully and accessibly written book shows that “Christian animism” is not a strange oxymoron, but Christianity’s natural habitat. Challenging traditional Christianity’s self-definition as an other-worldly religion, Wallace paves the way for a new Earth-loving spirituality grounded in the ancient image of an animal God.
Download or read book Heart of Darkness written by and published by . This book was released on with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Birds of North America written by Jacob Henry Studer and published by . This book was released on 1897 with total page 440 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Pigeons written by Andrew D. Blechman and published by Open Road + Grove/Atlantic. This book was released on 2007-12-01 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A “quirky, endlessly entertaining” look at the surprising history of the pigeon (Simon Winchester). Domesticated since the dawn of man, pigeons have been used as crucial communicators in war by every major historical superpower from ancient Egypt to the United States and are credited with saving thousands of lives. They have been worshipped as fertility goddesses and revered as symbols of peace. Charles Darwin relied heavily on pigeons to help formulate and support his theory of evolution. Yet today they are reviled as “rats with wings.” To research this lively history of the humble pigeon, the author traveled across the United States and Europe to meet with pigeon fanciers and pigeon haters in a quest to find out how we came to misunderstand one of mankind’s most helpful and steadfast companions. Pigeons captures a Brooklyn man’s quest to win the Main Event (the pigeon world’s equivalent of the Kentucky Derby), as well as a convention dedicated to breeding the perfect bird. The author participates in a live pigeon shoot where entrants pay $150; he tracks down Mike Tyson, the nation’s most famous pigeon lover; he spends time with Queen Elizabeth’s Royal Pigeon Handler; and he sheds light on a radical “pro-pigeon underground” in New York City. In Pigeons, Andrew D. Blechman reveals for the first time the remarkable story behind this seemingly unremarkable bird. “A quick and thoroughly entertaining read, Pigeons will leave readers chuckling at the quirky characters and pondering surprising pigeon facts.” —Audubon Magazine “Manages to illuminate not merely the ostensible subject of the book, but also something of the endearing, repellent, heroic, and dastardly nature of that most bizarre of breeds, Homo sapiens.” —Salon.com
Download or read book Paths of the Ancients Appalachia written by Kenneth Murray and published by The Overmountain Press. This book was released on 1993 with total page 130 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume leads the reader through a rich collection of Native American myths, pioneer legends, observations of early travelers, and historical narratives of the Southern Appalachian Mountains, along landscapes that have inspired wayfarers for unknown centuries. The rich, full-color photographs beckon to the region’s natural areas and embrace the enfolding serenity of deep forests, cascading streams, and uplifting vistas that recall the spiritual quests of ancestors who viewed the Appalachian Mountains as a sacred land to be treated with reverence and awe.
Download or read book The Passenger Pigeon written by William Butts Mershon and published by . This book was released on 1907 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
