George Prochnik

This is one of the finest biographies I have read. The author did a splendid job of bringing Zweig and the times to life by incorporating some of his own Jewish family's history of exile during the same period in history.

George Prochnik’s exquisite book "In Pursuit of Silence: Listening for Meaning in a World of Noise" finds the author writing eloquently about his own quest for silence in a world he finds overwhelmingly noisy. That journey leads us with him through visits with Trappist monks in the New Melleray Abbey in Dubuque, Iowa; students who, "when they wanted quiet," found it by "closing themselves inside their rooms and playing a computer game or turning on the television" (p. 286); an architect's show more client who wanted the perfectly silent home but found there was no way to achieve the levels of silence he craved; people involved with Deaf Architecture at Gallaudet University; Tommy, the King of Bass, and his boom cars with sound systems producing sounds loud enough to turn the author’s brain to Jell-O; and many other memorable characters. "Our aural diet is miserable," Prochnik tells us toward the end of the book. "It's full of over-rich, non-nutritious sounds served in inflated portions--and we don't consume nearly enough silence. A poor diet kills; but it kills as much because of what it does not contain as from what it includes" (p. 283). The book, on the other hand, offers the most nourishing of diets, and leaves us quietly and reflectively wishing for more. show less

Listening for Meaning in a World of Noise

One recent beautiful day, I was curled up with a book outside, enjoying the change in the light and air of fall, with a fat orange cat on my lap. The baby was asleep, work was done, and it was finally a chance to relax. It was bliss. All was quiet. Quiet, until an extremely loud dirt bike, without a muffler, began doing circuits of the road below my house. I went from peaceful and content to plotting murder in mere seconds…just the whine of the show more engine made my teeth ache. The fact I was reading this book made the noise all the more relevant.

George Prochnik takes a subject that is universally annoying and studies it in ways that are both fascinating and frightening. He examines the sounds, both in volume and type, that trigger aggression (see dirt bike above). In one chapter he discusses scientists who study the cries of infants that makes them particularly vulnerable to abuse (and what can be done for prevention). He takes the research further and shows how some sounds are actually used in torture (see dirt bike above). For example, prisoners in Guantanamo Bay are sometimes forced to listen to the cries of screaming infants overlaid with a track of repeating Meow Mix commercials.

He also investigates where sound is used for manipulation in a retail setting. He meets with the sound designers behind Abercrombie & Fitch, who intentionally design the retail space to flood the ears with rapid, pulsating music to mimic a rave or nightclub. The lights are intentionally dim, so that a customer feels more like they are at a party than a store, and they’ll likely pay less attention to the price tag and more attention to the atmosphere. Geared towards college age students that have left home for the first time, A & F manipulates their senses for profit while at the same time creating and branding their identity of ‘cool’. Prochnik also examines the science behind music played at grocery stores, restaurants, and bars. If it’s too fast, customers will eat faster and leave before they run up a tab. If it’s the right pace and overly loud, researchers have found they will actually drink more alcohol, since gesturing for another drink is easier than conversation.

Some anecdotal findings throughout are fascinating, as he travels from a monastery where silence is required, and out into the streets, where boom boxes, car stereos, train whistles, and sirens bombard the area with noise. In no way is he a cranky old Mr. Wilson, yelling at the kids to shut up. Rather, he’s fascinated by the science of it all. For example, scientists in Japan devised a “Mosquito Teen Deterrent” that is a sonic repellent-it makes a noise only audible to those under 20 years of age. This was used in areas where the police and storekeepers wanted to prevent teenage loitering, but its use is now up for debate in terms of ear damage. The invention was shown in one of the most memorable episodes of 30Rock. Clever teenagers managed to turn the tables on adults by using the same technology to create a cell phone ringer that could be used in class-the teacher couldn’t hear it ring!

Is sound really a matter of personal preference? Can laws really be enforced to control sound output from cars or homes? Prochnik investigates the influence of loud noise on health, and one especially interesting finding was that excessively loud noise, such as at a rave, actually makes the drug Ecstasy more toxic to users.

Beyond the noise itself, he also researches and explains new developments in sound proofing and the new industry that has been built up around the desire for peace and quiet. New materials and inventive uses of old technology can create homes that actually resist external noise. This book covers a great deal of material, and at times it’s too much to absorb at once. But the chapters can stand alone and can be returned to without losing the conceptual thread. In all, it's a fascinating book made especially interesting by the quick writing and large amount of cited evidence and details. show less

I received an ARC of this book from the publisher as part of the Goodreads First Read program.
In the early 20th century, Vienna, with its music, art, philosophy, literature, and architecture, was a center of modernist culture. An amazing number of thinkers gathered at Vienna’s famous coffeehouses.

Stephen Zweig was a part of this scene as a best-selling author of fiction and biography and mentor to younger authors. All this was turned upside down for the Viennese intellectuals and show more businessmen- especially Jews like Zweig- with the rise of Hitler. Zweig went into exile, first to England and the south of France, then to New York, and finally to Brazil in a tragic downhill spiral of a man who’s homeland was forever lost to him.

In The Impossible Exile, George Prochnik eloquently traces Zweig struggles with living away from Vienna and the intellectual scene that no longer existed. Prochnik draws on his own family’s experience in exile from Austria to give a broad picture of what Zweig left behind. While this book concentrates on Zweig’s life in exile, there is enough background material about his family and early life to make the reader, even one unfamiliar with Zweig, understand just how lost he was in exile and what lead to the final tragedy in Brazil.

An excellent read that brings to attention to this sometimes forgotten author and to the more general problem of people living in exile.

My only problem with this book was that it has no index. This was an advanced review copy; perhaps the finished edition has one. Non-fiction is enhanced by indexing, particularly a book like this that jumps around a bit in its chronology. I want to go back and see what it said about Freud or Marx, or the part about the house Zweig had in Salzburg without having to flip through the entire book. I withdrew a half a star for lack of index, otherwise I'd give it five. show less