A Book Of
Noises: Notes on the Auraculous – Caspar Henderson (2023)
Around eight years ago,
I read and reviewed a very cool book titled “The Book of Barely Imagined Beings”,
by Caspar Henderson. Mr. Henderson explored the world
of animals via the conceit of a bestiary where each chapter coincided with a
letter of the alphabet, and an animal whose name begins with said letter. It is an amazing book and one that opens the
mind to the infinite variety found in the natural world around us. Having dipped my toes into the mind of Caspar
Henderson, I was very happy to find A Book of Noises while browsing the
library shelves. This wonderful book
explores the vast landscape of sound, divided into chapters with titles such as
Cosmophony: Sounds of Space, Geophony: Sounds of Earth, Biophony:
Sounds of Life, ending with the chapter Anthropophony: Sounds of
Humanity. This is right up my alley!
Caspar Henderson comes
to the topic of sound and noise from the very best angle, that of wonder and
awe. The idea came to him after a visit
to a nature preserve on the Norfolk coast where he witnessed tens of thousands
of knots, a short stocky bird that migrates from the Arctic each year, flying
overhead. Within the cacophony Caspar
could distinguish individual wing flaps.
He coined the term “Auraculous” to describe such experiences, the word
meaning a marvel for the ear. This is
the true theme of this book. Mr.
Henderson explores the vast world of sound we live in and create and does so
with a sense of poetry and beauty fitting to the magical world that sound
provides to us. As he puts it, “writing
this book has been an attempt to listen more deeply and hold on to a sense of
aliveness, in which each moment is a validation of what came before and a
preparation for what comes after.” We
live out our lives ignoring most of the aural sensory input around us, much to
our detriment.
My favorite chapter,
Biophony: The Sounds of Life, explores the aural world of our plant and animal
brethren. I enjoyed reading about the
various sounds plants make, many of which our modern ears just ignore. One of the old Buddhist koans, meant to
encourage introspection, famously reads, “If a tree falls in the woods, and no
one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?”
I have always found this inane.
Of course it makes a sound. Sound
exists whether anything “hears’ it.
Sound is merely the vibration of the gas, liquid, and solid matter of
the world. Sound existed on Earth far
longer than life has been around and will continue to do so long after humans
reach extinction. Only the inflated
egocentrism of humans (which I think is the REAL lesson behind the koan) allows
us to imagine ourselves as the primal source of experience in the world. What a disservice this is to our fellow
living beings.
Caspar Henderson uses
the last chapter of this book for an exploration of the many sounds created by
humanity, from onomatopoeia and musical instruments to noise pollution, and
even to a rumination on silence itself.
In this chapter Mr. Henderson extrapolates the future of man-made sound,
including the ability to utilize sound for healing as well as for
weaponry. As with anything in the world,
whether it is used for good or evil is dependent on the human making the
decision. Sound can heal and it can
harm, therefore it is up to us to determine how best to use it to improve not
only humanity but the beautiful and varied world around us. The path towards good or towards evil is one
we embark on in our hearts and minds, way before any action comes. Books such as these help us maintain our
proper distance from our own ego and allow us to replace ignorance and
supposition with facts and logic. Caspar
Henderson does us all a great service through his writing. I have now read two of his works and will
look forward eagerly to the next one! To
Mr. Henderson, and everyone reading this who loves to search for the Auraculous,
I sign off with the rejoinder made famous on the now-defunct Sonic Youth Gossip
Forum, which exhorts the recipient to live a “Sonic Life!”
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