The breathtaking art of John James Audubon's Birds of America has been
celebrated throughout the world since it first appeared over 150 years
ago. Less well known is Audubon's literary legacy: the magnificent
volumes of natural history he published during his lifetime, as well as
the remarkable journals, memoirs, and letters left behind at his death.
In this unprecedented collection from The Library of America, Audubon
the great nature writer takes his rightful place alongside Audubon the
artist.
Here is the most comprehensive selection of Audubon's writings ever
published, along with a spectacular portfolio of his drawings. The
"Mississippi River Journal," the foremost record of an American artist's
progress, details Audubon's first wilderness bird hunts; it is as fresh
in its perceptions of the scenes and characters of the old South as of
the forest and its creatures. Selections from his "1826 Journal" follow
Audubon to Europe, where after years of relative obscurity and financial
distress his abilities were finally recognized. Audubon's masterwork,
the five-volume Ornithological Biography, is represented here by
forty-five entries. Charming, haunting, and violent by turns, these
vivid intimate portraits of the habits and habitats of American birds
changed American nature writing forever.
In the "Missouri River Journals," Audubon evokes the vanishing American
Indian and the hardships of frontier life. An extensive selection of
letters charting twenty years of Audubon's artistic development, along
with two essays on artistic technique and a brief memoir, round out the
volume. Whenever possible, texts have been painstakingly prepared from
original sources, without censorship or modernizing revision,
constituting a major contribution to Audubon scholarship. Detailed
general and ornithological indexes aid the reader in the field as well
as in the study.
Sixty-four full-color plates and several manuscript sketches, some never
before published, offer a unique perspective on Audubon's art. Including
original watercolors, aquatint engravings and lithographs, they reveal
the evolution of his compositions and the effects of his collaborations
with his publishers in ways never before seen.
LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization
founded in 1979 to preserve our nation's literary heritage by
publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America's best and most
significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than
300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in
length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are
printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.
