Overview

"A luminous exploration of the nature of thoughts, from daydreams to the voices in our heads At the moment you caught sight of this book, what were you thinking? Was your thought a stream of sensations? Or was it a voice in your head? Did you ask yourself, ""I wonder what that's about?"" Did you answer? And what does it mean if you did? When someone says they hear voices in their head, they are often thought to be mentally ill. But, as Charles Fernyhough argues in The Voices Within, such voices are better understood as one of the chief hallmarks of human thought. Our inner voices can be self-assured, funny, profound, hesitant, or mean; they can appear in different accents and even in sign language. We all hear them-and we needn't fear them. Indeed, we cannot live without them: we need them, whether to make decisions or to bring a book's characters to life as we read. Studying them can enrich our understanding of ourselves, and our understanding of the world around us; it can help us understand the experiences of visionary saints, who might otherwise be dismissed as schizophrenics; to alleviate the suffering of those who do have mental health problems; and to understand why the person next to us on the subway just burst out laughing for no apparent reason. Whether the voices in our heads are meandering lazily or clashing chaotically, they deserve to be heard. Bustling with insights from literature, film, art, and psychology, The Voices Within offers more than science; it powerfully entreats us all to take some time to hear ourselves think."

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Reviews

[ The Voices Within ] convincingly explores inner speech from a practical perspective.... Fernyhough presents an intriguing array of fresh findings and perspectives. He makes a persuasive case that one of the most inti-mate and private of our mental activities has a social origin. We talk to ourselves because we talked to others first. Nature Throughout Charles Fernyhough s fascinating tour d horizon he collapses many oppositions: between data and feelings, speaking and listening, external reality and our inner lives.... Stimulating and fruitful conversation. Literary Review

PRAISE FOR THE VOICES WITHIN The Voices Within intriguingly challenges conventional assumptions about the self as unified and coherent, while also posing the question: how might that which we deem pathological be shaped by the mores of our times? Christine Gross-Loh, Guardian, Best Books for Summer 2016 [A] fascinating and elegantly humane book. Guardian [Fernyhough s] account is fascinating, not only for the ideas he raises but also for his vignettes of historical thought and research. Lancet The psychologist Charles Fernyhough, who became interested in the manifold ways in which we commune with ourselves, decided to investigate the phenomenon and his book, The Voices Within, is the intriguing result of his research. Observer [The Voices Within] convincingly explores inner speech from a practical perspective.... Fernyhough presents an intriguing array of fresh findings and perspectives. He makes a persuasive case that one of the most inti-mate and private of our mental activities has a social origin. We talk to ourselves because we talked to others first. Nature Throughout Charles Fernyhough s fascinating tour d horizon he collapses many oppositions: between data and feelings, speaking and listening, external reality and our inner lives.... Stimulating and fruitful conversation. Literary Review Charles Fernyhough isn t just a scholar and a scientist, he is also a novelist, and this book reflects his unusual combination of gifts. It is an engaging and humane exploration of the experience of voices in our heads, delving into the origin of these voices in children, their contribution to problem-solving, creativity, and religious experience, their role in madness, and much else. This is a beautifully written and fascinating work. Paul Bloom, Professor of Psychology at Yale University, and author of Just Babies Perceptive, illuminating and humane. Gavin Francis, author of Adventures in Human Being

<b>PRAISE FOR <i>THE VOICES WITHIN</i> </b> The author s investigations, at once scientific and humane, represent the discipline of psychology at its rare bestThat Mr. Fernyhough is a novelist as well as a psychologist is evident in his illuminating discussion of the polyphonic art of fiction and the way in which writers such as Virginia Woolf, Muriel Spark and William Golding unpack characters from the voices they generate in those characters headsSome of the most compelling pages in Mr. Fernyhough s book describe how hearing voices may be a response to traumatic, sometimes repressed, memories, rather than merely being the result of the atypical processing of inner speech. The voices carry messages that cannot otherwise be spoken. .. After reading <i>The Voices Within</i>, you may never again be quite as thoughtless about the fact that you think. <b>Raymond Tallis, <i>Wall Street Journal</b></i> <i>The Voices Within</i>intriguingly challenges conventional assumptions about the self as unified and coherent, while also posing the question: how might that which we deem pathological be shaped by the mores of our times? <b>Christine Gross-Loh, <i>Guardian</i>, Best Books for Summer 2016</b> [A] fascinating and elegantly humane book. <b><i>Guardian</b></i> This sophisticated and appealing work scrutinizes a tangled topic with aplomb and will leave readers permanently observing their own thought processes differently. Perfect for readers of Oliver Sacks and Malcolm Gladwell. <b><i>Booklist</i>, starred review</b> Fernyhough s book is a valuable addition to the literature surrounding the unending human quest to understand the locationand the creationof the self. <b><i>Publishers Weekly</b></i> [Fernyhough s] account is fascinating, not only for the ideas he raises but also for his vignettes of historical thought and research. <b><i>Lancet</b></i> The psychologist Charles Fernyhough, who became interested in the manifold ways in which we commune with ourselves, decided to investigate the phenomenon and his book, <i>The Voices Within</i>, is the intriguing result of his research. <b><i>Observer</b></i> [<i>The Voices Within</i>] convincingly explores inner speech from a practical perspective.... Fernyhough presents an intriguing array of fresh findings and perspectives. He makes a persuasive case that one of the most inti-mate and private of our mental activities has a social origin. We talk to ourselves because we talked to others first. <b><i>Nature</b></i> Throughout Charles Fernyhough s fascinating tour d horizon he collapses many oppositions: between data and feelings, speaking and listening, external reality and our inner lives.... Stimulating and fruitful conversation. <b><i>Literary Review</b></i> Charles Fernyhough isn t just a scholar and a scientist, he is also a novelist, and this book reflects his unusual combination of gifts. It is an engaging and humane exploration of the experience of voices in our heads, delving into the origin of these voices in children, their contribution to problem-solving, creativity, and religious experience, their role in madness, and much else. This is a beautifully written and fascinating work. <b>Paul Bloom, Professor of Psychology at Yale University, and author of <i>Just Babies</i></b> Perceptive, illuminating and humane. <b>Gavin Francis, author of <i>Adventures in Human Being</b></i>

Praise for The Voices Within [ The Voices Within ] convincingly explores inner speech from a practical perspective Fernyhough presents an intriguing array of fresh findings and perspectives. He makes a persuasive case that one of the most inti-mate and private of our mental activities has a social origin. We talk to ourselves because we talked to others first. Nature Throughout Charles Fernyhough s fascinating tour d horizon he collapses many oppositions: between data and feelings, speaking and listening, external reality and our inner livesStimulating and fruitful conversation. Literary Review

Author Information

Charles Fernyhough is a writer and psychologist. He is the author of the critically acclaimed Pieces of Light, shortlisted for many prizes, and A Thousand Days of Wonder. He directs Hearing the Voice, a project on inner voices based at Durham University. He lives in County Durham, United Kingdom.

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