Diane Ackerman's Dawn Light

Diane Ackerman’s Dawn Light is a collection of essays of a variation on a theme; personal meditations on dawn. For 40 essays, she speaks to, about and on the subject of the sunrise. It is astounding how she can describe the beginning of the day in so many ways. Ackerman not only describes in color, “a dull red dawn, the color of deer and rust” (34)or “ricocheting colors” (54) ; she also describes in visuals such as “sun’s leading edge floats over the horizon.” (1) She also uses simile or metaphor such as sunrise “creating an effect like the thick spillage left by dripping candles” (49) or “in the twilight world, the full moon looks close and touchable as a pinata.” (63)  In Monet’s sunrises  “the lavish spell of the senses detained by a pink and blue sunrise, colors that create purple where they meet, in a softly puzzling war of blue and red that’s not so much hue as emotion.” (53) Ackerman often uses hyphenated words such as “eye-poppingly wonderful” (3) or “sun-and-storm-human-battered-planet.” (64)  She stretches the limits of description with so many tools at her disposal.

Most of the essays are highly researched. Ackerman keeps herself in the text by interjecting her favor for the topic with clauses such as “I prefer” or “I like.” In an essay on the planet Venus, Ackerman says “I like that Venus goes through phases like the moon.”(44) Or “I like that we use the planet’s astronomical symbol.” (45) Morsels like this, bring Ackerman’s authorial presence into the text. She also asks questions of the topic such as “How did Lucifer, the bright planet Venus, become Lucifer the devil?” (47) By asking the question, she brings herself into the text. So does her comment “the trouble with the Christian idea of Lucifer the devil is that neither Jesus nor the early prophets believed in him.” (47) We notice the author has an opinion about the subject at hand and has pondered it. Although Ackerman utilizes these other ways of invoking her presence in the text, she overuses the phrase “I like” breaking up thoughtful reflections with variations on a Valley Girl routine. It cheapens the text.

Inspired by Monet’s words “there are infinite number of sunrises to capture’ Ackerman has thoroughly researched different aspects of sunrises. She covers poet Sei Shonagon’s musings on the dawn, ancient practices regarding worship of the sun, and Monet’s depictions of the dawn among many others.