Polyteknisk Boghandel

More than money, power, and even happiness, silence has become the most precious commodity of our modern world. Now George Prochnik delivers a brilliant and far-reaching exploration of the frontiers of noise and silence, and of the growing war between them. In Pursuit of Silencegives context to our increasingly desperate sense that noise pollution is, in a very real way, an environmental catastrophe. Delving into the field with doctors, neuroscientists, acoustical engineers, monks, activists, educators, marketers, and aggrieved citizens, Prochnik examines the need for quiet from a medical, technological, political, philosophical, and spiritual perspective. As Prochnik travels across the United States and overseas, we meet a rich host of characters: an idealistic architect who is pioneering a new kind of silent architecture in collaboration with the deaf community at Gallaudet University; a special operations soldier in Afghanistan (and former guitarist with Nirvana) who places silence at the heart of survival in war; a sound designer for shopping malls who ensures that the stores we visit never stop their auditory seductions; and a group of commuters who successfully revolted against piped-in music in Grand Central Station. In Pursuit of Silenceis an important book that will appeal to fans of Malcolm Gladwell and Daniel Gilbert.