SOURCE: Beyers, Chris. “The Ornithological Autobiography of John James Audubon.” In Reading the Earth: New Directions on the Study of Literature and Environment, edited by Michael P. Branch, Rochelle Johnson, Daniel Patterson, and Scott Slovic, pp. 119‐28. Moscow, Idaho: University of Idaho Press, 1998.

In the following essay, Beyers claims that John James Audubon's Ornithological Biography, which includes prose descriptions of the birds he illustrated, also offers a complex portrait of the artist himself.

From 1827 to 1840 John James Audubon published The Birds of America, an audacious series of volumes that attempted to depict every bird native to the United States life‐size. Less well known is Audubon's five‐volume companion work, Ornithological Biography (1831‐40), prose descriptions of all the birds illustrated in The Birds of America. Though his popular reputation rests upon his accomplishments as a visual artist, the naturalist wrote a great deal of impressive prose besides Ornithological Biography. Audubon's...