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The Symphony of Silence: An Exploration of the Sound of AbsenceOther

by Amir Zadnemat

Who uses, recommends or left The Symphony of Silence: An Exploration of the Sound of Absence, in their own words: each a verbatim quote with a link to where it was said.

1 person

Rob Walker
Journalist and author of The Art of Noticing; writes the newsletter The Art of Noticing (TAoN) on attention and creativity.
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A few months ago I read an essay about silence by Amir Zadnemat in 3 Quarks Daily, called "The Symphony of Silence: An Exploration of the Sound of Absence"*. The most interesting section was a riff on various kinds of silence, especially in spoken language, each communicating something very distinct despite the fact that objectively each silence sounds (or I guess doesn't sound) identical:

TAoN issue on hunting for silence, built around an essay he read in 3 Quarks Daily.

2026-08-11·robwalker.substack.com ↗

Every entry is a verbatim quote and a link to the public post it came from. Nothing is paraphrased. If it is not on record somewhere public, it is not here.

The verdict is what they actually said: loved and liked are explicit; recommended means they told others to get it; uses means they only say they use it; read is a book on their public shelf with no verdict; mixed and disliked are kept too.

A dashed affiliate link, sponsored or their own label means the post disclosed a relationship. It is shown, never hidden.

The shading behind a date shows how dated a recommendation is for its kind of thing.

The shading behind a date shows how dated a recommendation is, for its kind of thing. Fully green is recent. It drains a quarter at a time as the post gets older, and is empty once it reads as dated.

What counts as old depends on the thing. A laptop praised four years ago has been replaced twice; a book loved twenty years ago is probably still loved. The shading is gone after about:

Stripes mean the post carries no date and the date shown is an estimate. No date at all, no shading.