If you are fortunate, you will encounter over the span of your literate life a few authors whose style cause you to catch your breath, and whose chosen subjects give you pause to reflect or to stand upon a sudden new horizon of perception. [a:Donald Culross Peattie|651969|Donald Culross Peattie|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/m_50x66-82093808bca726cb3249a493fbd3bd0f.png] is just such a one for me. Many of his works, such as this one, are to be savored slowly and in small portion. For to rush through them is to perhaps rob yourself of some golden time in contemplation.
[It must be acknowledged that Peattie shared in the casual racism and sexism of his time. (This book was published in 1937.) These seeped occasionally into his writing, and I do not wish to minimize either problem. But as Peattie says in the final chapter of A Book of Hours, "[M]an is not a fallen angel. But he may just possibly be on the evolutionary road toward angelic transmutation." I choose to believe that had Peattie lived longer, he might well have surmounted these attitudinal shortcomings.] ( )

The book begins at 3 in the morning with a man asleep, not exactly dreaming but with his imagination active. The stars and planets move, moths and fireflies are perhaps about. Each essay is another hour of the day in which some part of nature, including humans and cities, is featured.

This Book of Hours is a devotional for each hour of Earth's day - a reflection on the activities that buzz, or meditations that come to mind, at a particular longitude in the northern hemisphere during that hour on a day in May. At 1 in the afternoon, for instance, Peattie reflects on the Floral Clock of Linneaus, in which a different flower opens or closes each hour from 3 in the morning until midnight. At 6 in the evening he reflects upon the emptying of cities and the clatter of children at home. And so it goes, from the opening at 3 in the morning to the conclusion at 2 AM, the hour in folklore when the soul is most likely to leave the body.

Peattie published this book in 1937. The sentiments about the human race are much more optimistic than anyone writing today would dare express. The War to End All Wars had ended 20 years earlier. Hitler was not to invade Poland for another two years. His optimism about the human potential seemed justified. Peattie, a naturalist and writer, was valued in America for his poetic observations.

It's somewhat hard to appreciate the language because it is so dated, but there are times when the poetry wins out. ( )