` By the summer of 1998, it had become clear that there was something wrong with my hearing. It didn`t happen suddenly but softly, so softly I almost wasn`t aware of it happening; sound seemed to have stolen away.. .` For twelve years, Bella Bathurst was deaf. She missed the punchlines & the jokes, avoided busy restaurants & raucous parties, & grew her hair long to cover hearing aids. But then, twelve years later, pioneering surgery on her ears gave her the chance to hear again. Sound is the extraordinary story of Bella`s journey into deafness & back to hearing. Mixing memoir with interviews with soldiers, sign language experts, musicians & mental health workers, Bella explores what it means to live with & without sound, & in the process uncovers a hidden world of sense & connection. If sight gives us the world, then hearing
- or our ability to listen
- gives us each other. Warm, wry & honest, this is a story not just for the one in six of us with hearing loss, but for everyone who ever listened. Published in partnership with the Wellcome Collection. Wellcome Collection is a free museum & library that aims to challenge how we think & feel about health. Inspired by the medical objects & curiosities collected by Henry Wellcome, it connects science, medicine, life & art. Wellcome Collection exhibitions, events & books explore a diverse range of subjects, including consciousness, forensic medicine, emotions, sexology, identity & death. Wellcome Collection is part of Wellcome, a global charitable foundation that exists to improve health for everyone by helping great ideas to thrive, funding over 14, 000 researchers & projects in more than 70 countries.wellcomecollection.org