Book Review: A Winged History of the Netherlands by Jan Luiten van Zanden, et al.

 

Note: The title of this book has been translated into English by me for the reading comprehension of this blog's viewers as the book itself isn't available in English (yet). The original title reads Gevleugelde geschiedenis van Nederland.

I don't read too much bird non-fiction, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't interest me. So this book combining both birds and Dutch history spoke to me. Let's have a look.

In this book, the many authors each wrote a chapter regarding birds in the Netherlands or who came into contact with the Dutch. Whether it's about the troubles history of Corvidae here, or the domestication or introduction of various species, or the extinction of birds such as the great auk and the dodo, or Van Gogh's interest in bird-watching, or the use of goose quills for writing.

Overall I mostly had a good time reading this book. Mostly. It was definitely what I expected: a book covering the history of birds in the Netherlands. Heck, it's even more than that, because there's also some talk of birds which weren't in the Netherlands, but rather came into contact with the Dutch. Whether it is the dodo which came into contact with Dutch colonizers, or paradise birds being very beloved by the Dutch colonizing Asia.

With this comes of course the fact that I wish the book was a little more sensitive about the whole colonization aspect in these chapters. It writes about the colonization of these regions in a very dry matter-of-fact way and not like it's something awful to happen to the native peoples (and of course the local birds species which would often become hunted or even extinct because of them).  So, you know, a little bit more sensitivity around the issue would've been nice. 

Also, some of the chapters I just thought were written very dully. Don't get me wrong, most of them weren't, but others I just...wasn't all that invested in because of the writing voice. I think this is because each chapter is written by a different author, and therefore many writing voices are shown here. I just feel that not every chapter was super interesting (also, as another reviewer has brought up, there's literally an entire chapter dedicated to Johan de Witt's parrot. Which he apparently never owned, what even is the point  of dedicating a chapter to it, then?). 

That said, I did enjoy most of this book. It's expansive, it's informative, and I did think it was overall well-written. It was definitely interesting to see how our relationship with birds has changed throughout the years. Especially birds such as Corvidae (crows, ravens, Eurasian jays, magpies) had a very bad reputation throughout history, it appears, but luckily they're right now doing pretty okay. We still don't have a lot of ravens in the Netherlands at the moment, but at least there was a re-introduction project and they're no longer extinct here. 

So, yeah, overall an interesting book and it definitely taught me a thing or two about birds and Dutch history, I just think that some of the chapters could've either been cut or livened up a little in the dull writing voices. And a little more sensitivity regarding the whole colonization issue would've been nice, especially considering how recently this has been published.

Rating: 3.5/5