Vorab-Rezensenten

Noise is usually defined as unwanted sound: loud music from a neighbor, the honk of a taxicab, the roar of a supersonic jet. But as Garret Keizer illustrates in this probing investigation, noise is as much about what we want as about what we seek to avoid—as much about our conflicting desires as about our clamorous machines. A byproduct of human striving since ancient times and a hallmark of industrial development, noise has emerged as a significant cause of stress, disease, and violent contention in our own times. Decried as the sound of a society gone to the dogs and touted as a sign of democratic exuberance, noise has been opposed by scientists armed with decibel meters and by eccentrics dressed in tin hats; it has been used as an interrogation tool against suspected terrorists and as a curb to the passions of rutting bears. As Keizer hears it, noise gives us a key for understanding some of our most vital issues, including social inequality, climate change, and the ways we treat our children and our own embodied selves. In a journey that leads us from the primeval Tanzanian veldt to the modern streets of Mumbai, from the world’s biggest motorcycle rally in Sturgis, South Dakota, to wind farms in Maine, Keizer invites us to listen to noise in history, in popular culture, and not least of all in our own backyards. He examines noise and its political ramifications, the connection between one’s income and noise exposure, and the sometimes ironic relationship between economic growth and quality of life. He questions the United States’ influential role in an ever louder world and whether it’s intrinsically American to be loud. Finally, he considers what noise has to tell us about a sustainable future—especially noise pollution’s correlation with carbon emissions and its destruction of natural sounds and festive ways of life. Deeply satisfying and often humorous, The Unwanted Sound of Everything We Want is guaranteed to change how we hear the world and how we measure our own volume within it.