Birdsong

Use in the book

Rain does not necessarily silence the singers. On April 2 blackbirds, warblers, and the rest keep whistling and chirping; on April 25 refreshed throats fill newly resonant air. A list of species gives the chorus plurality, and a goose’s trumpet-like cry adds charm through contrast. The ensuing orchestral comparison makes harmony an effect of unlike contributors, not the exclusion of roughness.

Song is also vulnerable and timed. Storm-hidden birds begin phrases they do not finish, while the reproductive meditation associates the loss of song with the end of nesting. Evening brings a gradual redistribution of sound: most birds settle, yet blackbirds still chase and cry. These are observations of a living process rather than a perpetual pastoral soundtrack.

The human listener does not always share the joy he hears. In April 1833 nightingales sing day and night while he feels dead amid green life. In the following year a bird’s song can draw half his attention away from reading, helping make apparent idleness productive. Song’s meaning thus depends on the changing relation between sound and receptivity.

Places to read

1. 31 March 1833 · ¶1Birdsong is joined to nesting and the subsequent decline of reproductive display
2. 2 April 1833 · ¶1Birds continue through rain, resisting a simple fair-weather idyll
3. 23 April 1833 · ¶1Continuous nightingale song intensifies the observer’s exclusion from surrounding life
4. 25 April 1833 · ¶1Named voices and the goose’s contrast create an orchestral whole
5. 20 January 1834 · ¶1Evening quiet arrives at different times for different birds

Translation in this edition

Rossignolent becomes sing like nightingales in the April 2 translation. This makes the French verb’s comparison explicit; it does not add actual nightingales to the paragraph’s list of blackbirds, warblers, and songbirds.