Eduardo Santiago reviewed The Songs of Trees by David George Haskell
Review of 'The Songs of Trees' on 'Goodreads'
3 stars
Nothing at all like [b:Last Chance to See|23303196|Last Chance to See|Douglas Adams|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1412371125s/23303196.jpg|525730], and I’m pretty sure about that because I’ve just finished that one too: picked it up right after finishing Songs. Something made me do it. They’re not comparable in any way: Douglas Adams wrote from the perspective of a tourist, Haskell with that of a scientist with a lifetime expertise; Adams with humor, none of which is to be found in Songs. The commonality can best be summed up by Adams’s final sentence: “I have a terrible feeling that we are in trouble.”
Adams’s 1988 world still had Northern White Rhinos, Yangtze River Dolphins, and the faintest hope that those could be saved. They could imagine the world in thirty years. We can’t: it’s viscerally impossible for us to grasp the magnitude of what we’re losing. Haskell shows us what we have and how it’s fading; …
Nothing at all like [b:Last Chance to See|23303196|Last Chance to See|Douglas Adams|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1412371125s/23303196.jpg|525730], and I’m pretty sure about that because I’ve just finished that one too: picked it up right after finishing Songs. Something made me do it. They’re not comparable in any way: Douglas Adams wrote from the perspective of a tourist, Haskell with that of a scientist with a lifetime expertise; Adams with humor, none of which is to be found in Songs. The commonality can best be summed up by Adams’s final sentence: “I have a terrible feeling that we are in trouble.”
Adams’s 1988 world still had Northern White Rhinos, Yangtze River Dolphins, and the faintest hope that those could be saved. They could imagine the world in thirty years. We can’t: it’s viscerally impossible for us to grasp the magnitude of what we’re losing. Haskell shows us what we have and how it’s fading; we mourn with him but the scope this time is so much more vast. I won’t be alive in 2048 to find out, but some of you will be, and I’m sorry.
Unfortunately, Songs is painful reading in more ways than just the loss. It’s also difficult technically: Haskell’s vocabulary is immense, mine is not. Every page is filled with overly ornate prose and obscure words. Every chapter was a challenge to start: Haskell sets each scene with mystery, which works in novels but less so when you’re trying to figure out just where we are. Prepare to read two pages into each chapter, then start it over again to understand it. The book is worth reading, it just takes some serious commitment.