Nature

BIRDSONG IN A TIME OF SILENCE

STEVEN LOVATT

Particular Books, 160pp, £12.99

Among the unanticipated effects of last year’s daily walks in lockdown was the nation’s rediscovery of birdsong. As PD Smith, reviewing Steven Lovatt’s new book, put it in the : ‘The pandemic struck in the northern hemisphere just at the moment when birdsong was resuming after the bleak winter months. That “strangest spring” will be remembered not just for the new virus, but as the time when the nation became aware