Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Birds And Imagination

Mr Daeng showed us this book while we were still staying at his guesthouse at Doi Inthanon. He told us that a Japanese birder recently gave it to him. The title says 野鳥おもしろ図鑑 meaning something like 'funny bird encyclopedia', and it really is! I actually liked it since the cover page, with those square-bodied birds under the title. They are Eastern Great Egret, Japanese Grosbeak, Eurasian Tree Sparrow and Japanese Green Pheasant.


Inside containing colourful illustrations of all species of birds that can be found in Japan. What makes it outstanding is the playful style of drawing combining with jokes about each species of birds. I kept laughing as I go though each page, finding Japanese humour about birds and how to identify them. My favourite ones would be the albatrosses plate, where the real albatrosses are all riding on the albatross planes!, the woodpeckers plate where each species literally wearing red caps and the Black Woodpecker or Kuma-gera, meaning bear-woodpecker, is having four feet with two ears like the real bear!, and the last one, the Citrine Wagtail where the bird also literally has a head of lemon, and even scarier when the head was cut for juice! I think I'll sure be looking for this funny book when I get back to Japan. It's such a wonderful piece of art to be in the collection. Japanese people are sure good at this kind of work!

5 comments:

Ryou said...

Oh my goodness, I hope people won't misunderstand the 'lemon-headed' Wagtail! :-D Hahaha the illustrations are so interesting and amusing! I had a good time looking at each page you photographed. Thanks very much for sharing! Perhaps you can come out with such a book on the birds of Thailand, as you've good art skills too! Let me know when you publish it... ;-D

Ayuwat Jearwattanakanok said...

Thanks a lot Ryou for commenting on this post (and other older posts as well!) :D Having a book published is one of my little dreams. I've always wanted to have a chance to draw for a field guide as well.

Phil Slade said...

A very unusual, imaginative and probably unique book A. A good idea of Ryou's that you should have a go, plus you know I am a fan of your sketches. About time you featured some of those here to give them a wider audience.

Russell Jenkins said...

Very interesting! I'll have to look for it too.

Bhavesh Chhatbar said...

This is very interesting!