Topic > Bird Watching in Ornithological Biographies and "Pilgrim at Tinker Creek"

The simple events in our lives are often overlooked in our rushed and busy lives. Ornithological Biographies by John James Audubon and Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard show what happens when you stop to smell the roses, or rather, watch the birds. While describing similar events, the authors differ in their descriptions and opinions of what they both would observe as a wondrous phenomenon. The authors' dissimilar tone, divergent diction, and disparate style show how an event can be viewed in many ways. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay John James Audubon uses a more precise tone in his excerpt when he recounts the pigeon's migration from "northeast to southwest" (5 ). Audubon shows his use of precise diction by saying, "In a short time, finding the task I had undertaken impracticable, while the birds flocked in countless multitudes, I rose up, and counting the dots, then laid down, found that 163 [dots ] had been done in twenty-one minutes” (10-15). When the author describes this occasion, he had decided to sit down and count the number of flocks that had passed him. Instead of simply saying that he sat down to count the flocks, continues to say exactly how long he had been sitting on the bench and how many flocks he had counted The author does this to allow the reader to feel as if he is essentially undergoing what he is experiencing informal in her writing when she says, “I didn't move; they flew directly over my head for half an hour” (7-8). She adapts a tone that makes her sound like she's engaged in casual conversation who rounded the time period. Instead of being precise like Audubon marking the exact time period as “twenty-one minutes,” Dillard expresses the time period as half an hour. It allows the reader to imagine the scenario by providing a time estimate and also being casual in its description. Its simple setting and simple words are very different from Audubon's polysyllabic diction and extended description. John James Audubon's sophisticated diction creates a passage that seems well crafted and thoughtful. Annie Dillard's simple diction creates a more spontaneous description of the experience. When Dillard explains the beginning of the phenomenon, he clearly says, "From the darkening sky appeared a speck, then another, and another" (1-2) instead of adding details as Audubon does when he talks about birds flying en masse . . Audubon states, “In you almost solid masses, rushed forward in wavy and angular lines, descended and swept the earth with inconceivable velocity…which then resembled the coils of a gigantic serpent” (35-42). Audubon's description allows the reader to ask fewer questions. The passage is already well crafted and with the use of polysyllabic diction, the reader would prefer to find Audubon as a fairly intelligible individual while Dillard's passage doesn't so much use polysyllables as create an image that seemed almost effortless; a piece of art. John James Audubon's excerpt is an extended and detailed description of an experience he had during his normal day. Although complex, the way he describes the experience is almost scientific. It gives exact numbers on how many flocks flew past it in an exact period of time and precisely in the direction they were flying. He describes a situation almost like the big bang theory: "Immediately, like a torrent, and with a noise like thunder, they rushed in a compact mass, pressing on each other towards.