Noise: A Human History Of Sound And Listening

Product Description

Based on a major BBC Radio 4 series David Hendy explores the role of sound
- & of listening
- in 100 000 years of human history. In prehistoric caves drummers used natural acoustics to recreate natural sound. In classical Europe orators turned the human voice into a lyrical instrument. In Buddhist temples the icons' ears were exaggerated to represent their spiritual power. & in modern metropolises we are battered by the roar of sound that surrounds us. In the first narrative history of the subject which puts humans at its centre & coinciding with the author's major Radio 4 series on the same subject acclaimed historian David Hendy describes the history of noise
- which is also the history of listening. As he puts it himself: ' By thinking about sound & listening I want to get closer to what it felt like to live in the past or be caught up in the major events of history. The book is a chance for readers to discover more of the personal & social background to those stories featured in the radio series.' This unusual book reveals fascinating changes in how we have understood our fellow human humans & the world around us. For although we might see ourselves inhabiting a visual world our lives are shaped by our need to hear & be heard.