Saturday, April 9, 2016 - 6:00pm
Collected Works is honored to present Helen MacDonald, author of H is for Hawk and Shaler's Fish.
A New York Times Bestseller
One of the New York Times Book Review 10 Best Books of the Year
A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
TIME, NPR, O, The Oprah Magazine, Vogue, Washington Post, Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, Seattle Times, Miami Herald, St. Louis Post Dispatch, Star Tribune, Library Journal, Publishers Weekly, Kirkus Reviews, Slate, Shelf Awareness, Book Riot
Winner of the Costa Book Award
Winner of the Samuel Johnson Prize
Finalist for the Kirkus Prize
Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award
When Helen Macdonald’s father died suddenly on a London street, she was devastated. An experienced falconer—Helen had been captivated by hawks since childhood—she’d never before been tempted to train one of the most vicious predators, the goshawk. But in her grief, she saw that the goshawk’s fierce and feral temperament mirrored her own. Resolving to purchase and raise the deadly creature as a means to cope with her loss, she adopted Mabel, and turned to the guidance of The Once and Future King author T.H. White's chronicle The Goshawk to begin her challenging endeavor. Projecting herself “in the hawk's wild mind to tame her” tested the limits of Macdonald’s humanity and changed her life.
Heart-wrenching and humorous, this book is an unflinching account of bereavement and a unique look at the magnetism of an extraordinary beast, with a parallel examination of a legendary writer’s eccentric falconry. Obsession, madness, memory, myth, and history combine to achieve a distinctive blend of nature writing and memoir from an outstanding literary innovator.
Before Helen Macdonald rose to international acclaim with her "beautiful and nearly feral" bestselling memoir H Is for Hawk, she wrote a collection of poetry, Shaler's Fish. In robust, lyrical verse, Shaler's Fish roams both the outer and inner landscapes of the poet's universe, seamlessly fusing reflections on language, science, and literature, with the loamy environments of the natural worlds around her. Moving between the epic—war, history, art, myth, philosophy—and the specific—CNN, Ancient Rome, Auden, Merleau-Ponty—Macdonald examines with humor and intellect what it means to be awake and watchful in the world. These are poems that probe and question, within whose nimble ecosystems we are as likely to encounter Schubert as we are "a hand of violets," Isaac Newton as a "winged quail on turf." Nothing escapes Macdonald's eye and every creature herein—from the smallest bird to the loftiest thinker—holds a significant place in her poems.
This is an unparalleled collection from one of greatest nature writers, and a poet of dazzling music and vision.
Helen Macdonald is a writer, poet, illustrator and naturalist, and an affiliated research scholar at the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Cambridge. She is the author of the bestselling H Is for Hawk, as well as a cultural history of falcons, titled Falcon, and three collections of poetry, including Shaler's Fish. Macdonald was a Research Fellow at Jesus College, Cambridge, has worked as a professional falconer, and has assisted with the management of raptor research and conservation projects across Eurasia. She now writes for the New York Times Magazine.
H Is for Hawk (Paperback)
By Helen MacDonald
$16.00
ISBN: 9780802124739
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Grove Press - March 8th, 2016
Shaler's Fish: Poems (Hardcover)
By Helen MacDonald
$22.00
ISBN: 9780802124630
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Atlantic Monthly Press - February 2nd, 2016