Die Nachtigall

Actually, the nightingale is an inconspicuous little brown bird. Average in appearance, weight and behaviour. But when the males begin to sing on warm spring nights, the hearts of lovers beat just as fast as those of ornithologists. The nightingale's song is anything but average and its complexity, with no less than two hundred different types of strophes, completely outshines that of other songbirds. But what does the nightingale actually sing and why? And what did generations of poets and composers see in its song? The biologist Silke Kipper has been researching the nightingale for more than twenty years, she has spent countless spring nights listening in Berlin parks and in her book she gets to the bottom of the nightingale's song and our fascination with it.

A knowledgeable yet light-footed portrait of what is probably the most popular songbird, its song, and at the same time a well-founded insight into nightingale research and reception.