Mozart's Starling

Quotes

"This hard-to-put-down, charming blend of science, biography, and memoir illuminating the little-known story of the composer and his beloved bird is enlivened by the immediacy of Haupt's tales of Carmen, and brimming with starling information, travelogues, and historical details about Mozart's Vienna."—Booklist (Starred Review)

"Weaving together cheerful memoir, natural history, and biography, the author celebrates her 'insatiably social' pet starling, Carmen; investigates Mozart's experience with his avian companion... and offers intriguing details about starling behavior."—Kirkus Reviews

"Stories of [Carmen's] upbringing interspersed with details about Mozart, his family and career are both delightful and interesting."—Seattle Times

"Charming and highly readable."—St. Louis Post-Dispatch

"Mozart's Starling is a delightful, enlightening, breathless flight through the worlds of Carmen and Star, two European starlings who join their human counterparts in exploring life and music and nature, helping to shed light on the connection between humans and birds -- those of us bound to terra firma, and those who are free to soar."—Garth Stein, author of The Art of Racing in the Rain and A Sudden Light

"Mozart's Starling sparkles with imagination, emotion, and insight. Common birds, who too many consider vermin, have great gifts to share. Thank you, Lyanda Lynn Haupt, for showing us the delight and magic of a starling."—Sy Montgomery, author of Birdology and The Soul of an Octopus

"Lyanda Lynn Haupt raised a starling of her own to see if the tale of Mozart and his starling could be true. Her experience brings the legend of musician and bird into our present world where science rules. Yet even today, the song of the starling, but a minute in length, lies at the very limits of human comprehension. Read the book and you will learn why."—David Rothenberg, author of Why Birds Sing and Survival of the Beautiful

"A brave thing it is to write a love-song to starlings, in a conservation culture inclined not only to struggle with exotic species, but to demonize them. But Lyanda Haupt has done just that--not as apologist for wildlings in North America, but as celebrant of an utterly extraordinary, beautiful, and deeply engaging animal in and of itself. In prose as lovely as birdsong and as clear and sharp as the cool air itself, she has given starlings--hers, Mozart's, the whole species--the kind of loving and rigorous Life that every kind of creature deserves but very few get. I thought of Gerald Durrell, Konrad Lorenz, and Jane Goodall, none of whom I loved reading more. The story of Carmen, Star, and their humans is as riveting as a good novel, and I learned as much about Mozart as about birdsong and birdbrains. I enjoyed Mozart's Starling immensely, and I challenge anyone to read it and still treat starlings inhumanely. Lucky is the bird that finds its Papagena."—Robert Michael Pyle, author of Through a Green Lens and Mariposa Road

"By raising up her own pet starling, Lyanda Lynn Haupt reveals something that music historians have missed -- how daily life with a bird impacted Mozart during his most productive period. By sharing this delightful tale with the rest of us, she also reveals the unexpected quirks and charms of a species too often dismissed as a pest. Mozart's Starling is pure pleasure."—Thor Hanson, author of The Triumph of Seeds

"Haupt's is an informative and entertaining book of a well-versed ornithologist/ naturalist who adopted a five-day old starling chick into the family. Starlings are well known for their vocal ingenuity that had entranced not only Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, but also biologists and linguists. The bird that had entranced Mozart entranced Haupt as well, and in part for the same reasons. Starlings and humans are both highly social and vocal, providing an opportunity for mutual bonding and cross-species communication. Indeed, there is debate whether Mozart was influenced by his starling or vice versa. Haupt's adventure with the starling that became a companion and bond-mate prompted a classic adventure into the nature of the bird, music, and Mozart's relationships. This highly readable account is a success at several levels, and is bound to become a classic."—Bernd Heinrich, author of Mind of the Raven and One Wild Bird at a Time