“Can one diagnose the state of a nation through its attitude toward its aviary? This new volume from the Library of America makes such a project seem possible, assembling a centuries-long archive of U.S. bird writing that claims to act as nothing less than a ‘field guide to the American soul.’ Indeed, a well-worn literary history can be wrought from these pages. . . . The entries are unified by a sense of heightened attention induced by the writer’s encounter with a wild, flying thing; beyond this, however, the genres, moods, and styles are as diverse as the birds they catalog.“—Kirkus Reviews