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jdintr's review
4.0
In his award-winning book, The Forest Unseen, Haskell established a tabletop-sized "mandala" in a forest outside his college in Sewanee, Tennessee, and observed the goings-on over the course of a year. It remains an amazing work of writing, mixing fascinating facts about ants, fungi, chickadees (among other subjects) with deep insights into the natural world.
In Songs of the Trees Haskell makes his mandala mobile, choosing trees around the world as his subjects: a fir in the Canadian wilderness, a Colorado pine, even a tree in New York City whose bark he listens to for signs of the secrets of life.
The science in SOTT is stronger than TFU, and the insights are much deeper, much more complex. Medications on worship/supernatural interact with those on pollution and global warming. I put it down for a few months, overwhelmed by the language. (I usually read before bed, when my mind isn't the most engaged.) Once I promoted it to "Saturday afternoon" I really enjoyed the book.
In Songs of the Trees Haskell makes his mandala mobile, choosing trees around the world as his subjects: a fir in the Canadian wilderness, a Colorado pine, even a tree in New York City whose bark he listens to for signs of the secrets of life.
The science in SOTT is stronger than TFU, and the insights are much deeper, much more complex. Medications on worship/supernatural interact with those on pollution and global warming. I put it down for a few months, overwhelmed by the language. (I usually read before bed, when my mind isn't the most engaged.) Once I promoted it to "Saturday afternoon" I really enjoyed the book.
_justlillian_'s review
1.0
DNF - A dense and arduous read, even with the coordinated photos and recordings on his blog. I’m relieved to let this one go.
zoe_'s review against another edition
challenging
informative
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
4.5
Re-read in December of the same year as my original review:
4.5 stars
About halfway through the book, I thought that I would stand by my original review but with the added "I simply like it better this time round" but now that I'm finished I think my previous review was stupid. Yeah, of course, I would have liked to have more concrete information about plants but I think back in October I was just looking for a textbook instead. So, yeah, my bad, I'm an idiot sometimes. Also, I don't even stand by "I simply like it better this time round" anymore, because, actually, I like it significantly more, I'd go as far as to say that I kinda love this book. I might even round my rating up, depending on how everything settles in my mind.
To be fair to previous me, a lot of my newly found enthusiasm comes from my own analysis of the book and thinking quite deeply about it. That being said, I could have just been more thoughtful earlier. Who would have thought that not even two months can make this much of a difference?
Anyway, great book, would highly recommend.
___
Original review:
3.5 stars
I believe that Haskell essentially wanted to make it clear to the reader that trees are so connected to the rest of the world that "their songs" are the noises of all those aspect that surround them and that interact with them/they interact with. Which is why the focus of this book often shifted away from the trees themselves. This would normally not be a problem but I was really looking forward to learning more about trees. So, really, my rating boils down to personal preference. I think Haskell's decision to focus on more "approachable" aspects to humans (like humans) and to encode a lot of the "tree information" in very flowery/literary language is intelligent to approach the general reader. I simply want to read a tree book with as much tree as possible in it.
4.5 stars
About halfway through the book, I thought that I would stand by my original review but with the added "I simply like it better this time round" but now that I'm finished I think my previous review was stupid. Yeah, of course, I would have liked to have more concrete information about plants but I think back in October I was just looking for a textbook instead. So, yeah, my bad, I'm an idiot sometimes. Also, I don't even stand by "I simply like it better this time round" anymore, because, actually, I like it significantly more, I'd go as far as to say that I kinda love this book. I might even round my rating up, depending on how everything settles in my mind.
To be fair to previous me, a lot of my newly found enthusiasm comes from my own analysis of the book and thinking quite deeply about it. That being said, I could have just been more thoughtful earlier. Who would have thought that not even two months can make this much of a difference?
Anyway, great book, would highly recommend.
___
Original review:
3.5 stars
I believe that Haskell essentially wanted to make it clear to the reader that trees are so connected to the rest of the world that "their songs" are the noises of all those aspect that surround them and that interact with them/they interact with. Which is why the focus of this book often shifted away from the trees themselves. This would normally not be a problem but I was really looking forward to learning more about trees. So, really, my rating boils down to personal preference. I think Haskell's decision to focus on more "approachable" aspects to humans (like humans) and to encode a lot of the "tree information" in very flowery/literary language is intelligent to approach the general reader. I simply want to read a tree book with as much tree as possible in it.
justjess79's review against another edition
2.0
This was definitely a case of “it’s the reader, not the book.” This book is interesting and well written. I just couldn’t get into it. I have nothing negative to say, it was purely just not what I was expecting and I think I’ve read too many biology-based books lately and this one suffered for it.
jmckendry's review against another edition
3.0
I feel like the rating I gave this book doesn't accurately portray how I felt about it. I love science, I love learning about how things work, and I have always loved trees. So when I picked up this book, I kind of expected it to talk about the biology of trees, and instead it was more about how trees connect to their environments, but also about how we as humans are connected to trees in our own environments.
This book was poetic and beautiful, however it was just not quite what I was expecting and hoping to get out of it. That being said, I did enjoy reading it once I was able to accept that this wasn't going to be a book about tree biology.
This book was poetic and beautiful, however it was just not quite what I was expecting and hoping to get out of it. That being said, I did enjoy reading it once I was able to accept that this wasn't going to be a book about tree biology.
otter126's review against another edition
Beautiful book, deserves a closer focus than I could give at the moment
ngominh's review
5.0
Cây cối đã đứng đó như một hiện thân từ trong lịch sử. Những cây olive ở xứ Tiểu Á vừa là ngọn nguồn vừa là phế tích cho những kì địa chất đã qua. Những trầm tích phấn hoa bay qua Biển Chết báo hiệu một lịch sử dài của chính loài người. Từ cổ chí kim khi qua những kiến tạo địa chất cho đến nhân tạo hơn, trong cuộc chiến giữa Palestine và Israel hay quả bom nguyên tử biến Hiroshima thành bãi chiến địa; thì cây cối vẫn vững vàng, đứng đó, và ghi lại âm thầm trong mình một khúc hát riêng. Tường tận, bao quát mà đầy trữ tình; Khúc hát của cây là một tác phẩm lớn làm nên cuộc cách mạng về nhân tính, về sợi dây kết nối và hơn hết là vẻ đẹp của tự nhiên, để đặt ngang hàng với những tuyệt tác của Thoreau, Rachel Carson hay Aldo Leopold.
Haskell một cách tài tình với bộ não của một nhà khoa học trong giọng kể của một nhà thơ đã một lần nữa đi lại từ đầu, thức tỉnh, đánh bóng và làm rõ vai trò của loài Homo sapiens trong mạng lưới đầy phức tạp này. Haskell không phải là người tiên phong chỉ riêng trong việc lắng nghe cây cỏ; mà ông vươn xa hơn với tác phẩm này, để đến với những trường đoạn triết học, đạo đức, tôn giáo, chính trị… thông qua đời sống tự nhiên. Ở đó liệu cây hay những loài sinh vật khác có nhận thức được thẩm mỹ hay những làn ranh đạo đức ta vẫn thường nghe? Vì bởi giá trị vẻ đẹp nằm ở trạng thái bên ngoài. Nó tồn tại trong tâm trí kẻ đang chiêm ngưỡng, nên hoàn toàn có thể nói rằng, cây cối hay mọi thành phần trong một mạng lưới đều có một thẩm mỹ riêng. Và có hay không lằn ranh đạo đức chia đôi thế giới thành hai đối trọng 'chúng ta' và 'chúng', khi con người rốt cuộc cũng là tự nhiên, khi hủy hoại môi trường cũng đang đồng thời giết đi chính mình, bởi bất cứ loài sinh vật nào cũng có một thẩm mỹ riêng, một vẻ đẹp riêng, một trí khôn riêng?
Haskell một cách tài tình với bộ não của một nhà khoa học trong giọng kể của một nhà thơ đã một lần nữa đi lại từ đầu, thức tỉnh, đánh bóng và làm rõ vai trò của loài Homo sapiens trong mạng lưới đầy phức tạp này. Haskell không phải là người tiên phong chỉ riêng trong việc lắng nghe cây cỏ; mà ông vươn xa hơn với tác phẩm này, để đến với những trường đoạn triết học, đạo đức, tôn giáo, chính trị… thông qua đời sống tự nhiên. Ở đó liệu cây hay những loài sinh vật khác có nhận thức được thẩm mỹ hay những làn ranh đạo đức ta vẫn thường nghe? Vì bởi giá trị vẻ đẹp nằm ở trạng thái bên ngoài. Nó tồn tại trong tâm trí kẻ đang chiêm ngưỡng, nên hoàn toàn có thể nói rằng, cây cối hay mọi thành phần trong một mạng lưới đều có một thẩm mỹ riêng. Và có hay không lằn ranh đạo đức chia đôi thế giới thành hai đối trọng 'chúng ta' và 'chúng', khi con người rốt cuộc cũng là tự nhiên, khi hủy hoại môi trường cũng đang đồng thời giết đi chính mình, bởi bất cứ loài sinh vật nào cũng có một thẩm mỹ riêng, một vẻ đẹp riêng, một trí khôn riêng?