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The Goshawk (New York Review Books Classics)

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the authority established, the perserverance not now flouted lest it should be thought of as weak thereafter”, “Yet it was sometimes difficult to believe that he was not merely being naughty. It was as if he were holding aloft the flag of some long-defeated country to which he staked his allegiance. After reading about shad, for example, I wonder at my reaction the next time I meet someone named 'Milt'.

What a bursting heart of gratitude and triumph as the ravening monster slowly paced down the arm with gripping steps and pounced upon his breakfast!

The writing, is in parts wonderfully life-affirming, but it is the stark desolation and nihilism that many readers most remember. Qualunque crudeltà ha l’effetto immediato d’incattivirli, ed è quindi peggio che inutile, perché l’uccello non si piegherà né arrenderà mai. There's a special purview of human experience where thought becomes play, effort becomes wisdom, and sustained activity transcends its mortal bonds and bounds straight into the realms of art, icon, and wonder.

It must have been like death-- the thing which we can never know beforehand--as, with clumsy talons groping for an unnatural foothold, his fledgeling consciousness was hunched and bundled in the oblong, alien surroundingness. The training, primarily, consists of exerting an endless patience as you hold the hawk by its straps and wait until it no longer "bates" away, attempting to fly off your fist. But, because he is unaware of his mistakes at the time, what comes over has no cruelty in it whatsoever; frustration and occasional despair, yes, but otherwise just the very honest account of a lonely man's struggle to bond with this wild creature of the air.In typical English fashion, a hierarchy of raptors was allowed to the falconer or austringer depending on ones class; an eagle for an emperor, a peregrine for an earl, a goshawk for a yeoman, and a kestrel for a knave. I think it's best to say that its joy lies in both themes: showing us how clumsy we are in the world yet how joyful the labor to attempt to do so and bad-ass descriptions of training a bird of prey.

I tend to favor the smaller books and picked it up, but almost put it back when I discovered it was about falconry, published years ago. It had been a Bank of England apprehension, a painful impotence, a Come-you-here arrest by all-powerful police. All focus is on the lived experience, finger poised on the camera button, waiting, watching, listening. By using the Web site, you confirm that you have read, understood, and agreed to be bound by the Terms and Conditions. Still, White's enthusiasm for the sport and for the intense relationship between falconer and hawk is moving and incisive.There are also some casual remarks on guerrilla rewilding that will make a few readers wince – how did those Czech-origin Pine Martens Martes martes get back to the New Forest? H. White, and the reason why I love his writing shines through in punctuated brilliance in this brief book.

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