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A Book of Noises: Notes on the Auraculous

by Caspar Henderson

Listening across the soundscape

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AlbakiReads Editorial

Listening across the soundscape

Caspar Henderson organizes this exploration of sound into 48 essays spanning human activity, other forms of life, the planet, and space. Familiar noises—such as a bell, a bee, or a song that lingers in the mind—sit alongside sounds that are rarely or perhaps never heard, including a volcano’s deep boom and the rustle attributed to the Northern Lights. The range gives everyday listening a broader frame, connecting small domestic and natural sounds with larger questions about what can be heard across the world. The book’s central subject is not music alone, but sound in its many forms and sources.

Good fit for readers who enjoy

  • Readers interested in acoustics and the sounds of the natural and human worlds
  • Those who enjoy essay collections organized around a broad subject
  • Readers curious about how sound extends from everyday noises to planetary and cosmic phenomena

Themes

Sound and listeningHuman, animal, planetary, and cosmic soundEveryday perceptionThe natural world

Based on publisher information and book metadata.

Book overview

A wide-ranging exploration of the sounds that shape our world in invisible yet significant ways.

The crackling of a campfire. The scratch, hiss, and pop of a vinyl record. The first glug of wine as it is poured from a bottle. These are just a few of writer Caspar Henderson's favorite sounds. In A Book of Noises, Henderson invites readers to use their ears a little better--to tune in to the world in all its surprising noisiness.

Describing sounds from around the natural and human world, the forty-eight essays that make up A Book of Noises are a celebration of all things "auraculous." Henderson calls on his characteristic curiosity to explore sounds related to humans (anthropophony), other life (biophony), the planet (geophony), and space (cosmophony). Henderson finds the beauty in everyday sounds, like the ringing of a bell, the buzz of a bee, or the "earworm" songs that get stuck in our heads. A Book of Noises also explores the marvelous, miraculous sounds we may never get the chance to hear, like the deep boom of a volcano or the quiet, rustling sound of the Northern Lights.

A Book of Noises will teach readers to really listen to the sounds of the world around them, to broaden and deepen their appreciation of the humans, animals, rocks, and trees simultaneously broadcasting across the whole spectrum of sentience.
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