John Hay

The Bird of Light

"Joy Hay is one of our very best essayists on the natural world, and The Bird of Light is a fine example of his work." —Peter Matthiessen

Here is an evocative, closely observed portrait of terns, as the noted naturalist John Hay has watched these "tirelessly flying, excitable, vulnerable birds" for years on Cape Cod. Celebrating their beauty, Hay describes all aspects of the birds' lives, from threats by enemies (inlcuding human beings' neglect of the environment) to mating rituals, the wild tumult of a crowded nesting site, and their long-range migrations.

"John Hay, at the top of his powers, has written a great poem of the earth. He gives us the real, wild planet, threaded by long-migrating terns and ordered by the cycles of the storm and sun the birds must deal with. . . . I believe The Bird of Light is one of the significant books of the year." —Thomas J. Lyon

"A lurical and factually engrossing account of the lives of terns—dazzling aerial acrobatics and 'untiring, restless explorers of our planet' . . . a small masterwork. . . . Hay has a rare gift, and, like Thoreau, can life us from earthbound minutiae to the oceanic." —Kirkus Reviews

"No one brings the world to our senses (and our hearts) as symphonically as John Hay. Like the shorebirds he knows so well, he is forever ahead of us, urging us on to oceanic understandings. . . . More than just 'nature-writing,' The Bird of Light is about the best distillation you can find of the kinds of attitudes that we will ignore at our peril." —Jake Page