The Fullness of Time: A Review by Libricola

Join Libricola in examining The Fullness of Time in connection with this month’s focus on the Haydens.

The Fullness of Time: Marking the Day by Birdsong, Blooms, Shadows, and Stars may sound like an inspirational how-to for early risers and night owls. It’s also an informative history of traditional ways of telling time. Cathy Haynes, an artist and curator, has incorporated ideas about time into previous projects. She combines that expertise with new explorations of time for this enjoyable book. 

Each chapter can stand alone, and I initially chose just a couple. Haynes’s enthusiasm for her time-telling urban walks and road-trips, as well as her gorgeous writing, made me go back and read it all. 

Telling time without clocks requires knowing the natural world with a particular awareness of one’s local environment. It goes without saying that many of us could not compete with our ancestors in these areas. Haynes, with an intelligent artist’s eye, opens the possibility of a renewed (and fun!) connection to the world that we’re all a part of.  Her adventures are enriched with just enough science and history as well as a quirky collection of images. 

Chapters cover telling time with natural and human-made shadows and from noting the predictable interplay of daylight and landmarks. Many elements of the world respond to changes in the time of day or season, and there are chapters on plants, animals, and the locations of stars. 

I  finally learned how ships navigate by the stars, which I had always wondered about. Understanding twilight is an essential part of the skill. In my favorite chapter, Haynes explains that twilight has established phases based on scientific knowledge of Earth’s rotation, but also on our perception of color.  Science eventually designated what previous generations observed: twilight vividly revealing increments of time, just like the sunrises and sunsets that we still observe today.

This book made me think about everyday lived experience in the past hiding behind the history in books. Past generations lived by the knowledge and skills Haynes explores. Some people still do. We all can. 

In this month’s blog, Memoria writes about Harriet Hayden, a key figure in Boston’s Underground Railroad. The post got me thinking more about the journeys of freedom-seekers. How many told time in these ways, maybe gauging how much darkness remained to them for safer travel? Did they use the stars, animals stirring, or birdsong? This skill may have given them comfort, or helped them confidently make vital decisions. Haynes’s book makes me want to explore their experiences in more detail.

One of my favorite lines in poetry is Emily Dickinson’s “There's a certain Slant of light,/

Winter Afternoons –.” For me, Haynes’s book has added depth to my sense of time around the moment. I think it will inspire me to consider historical ways of knowing and of being when I read about the past. Furthermore, it will cause me to pay more attention to time expressing itself in the world around me.