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In Pursuit Of Silence: Listening For Meaning In A World Of Noise (2010)

by George Prochnik(Favorite Author)

3.43 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

0385528884 (ISBN13: 9780385528887)

languge

English

genre

Nonfiction

publisher

Doubleday

review 1: Sound, like food, water, oil, is a natural resource. It doesn't grow on trees, fall from skies or sit silently underground waiting to be discovered. But sound - like any natural resource - can starve or spoil a city.In Pursuit of Silence awakens our consciousness of the noise around us that both invigorates and destroys a setting, as Prochnik delves into the sciences of audio, psychology, geography and even engineering. Like a research paper on crack, this book tells a story that reminds us of the piece of ourselves that we sacrifice for sound around us, and challenges us to see our society as a box of chaos and ask, "Are we locked in, or are peace and quiet locked out?"I personally enjoyed the book very much; I found the unconventional topic to be very intriguing and was ... moreimpressed by how closely the author related psychology to spirituality, without however, actually touching on spirituality at all.This is a book for anyone with an interest in social- or neuro-studies, as well as meditation and self-help. It will hold your interest as a novel would, while maintaining its status as an informative documentary of the effects of a loud society. I think In Pursuit of Silence would be especially enlightening to someone with an interest in cultural differences between the eastern and western hemispheres; while noise is universal, you'd be surprised to learn that its results aren't always as consistent.
review 2: While this book has its moments, I found it disappointing overall. The author spends a lot of time talking about noise rather than silence, and advances in the sound-proofing industry are given far too much geography. The book begins and ends strongly, those sections where the author really discusses his pursuit of silence. What gets left out from the promising title, however, is "meaning." The meaning and importance of silence is just not central enough to the narrative to justify the title. Favorite passage: "Rather than conceiving of the noise surrounding most of us as a pollution issue, we might think of it as a dietary problem. Our aural diet is miserable. It's full of over-rich, non-nutritious sounds served in inflated portions--and we don't consume nearly enough silence." less

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