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The Storytelling Animal
- How Stories Make Us Human
- Narrated by: Kris Koscheski
- Length: 5 hrs and 32 mins
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Publisher's summary
Humans live in landscapes of make-believe. We spin fantasies. We devour novels, films, and plays. Even sporting events and criminal trials unfold as narratives. Yet the world of story has long remained an undiscovered and unmapped country. It's easy to say that humans are "wired" for story, but why?
In this delightful and original book, Jonathan Gottschall offers the first unified theory of storytelling. He argues that stories help us navigate life's complex social problems - just as flight simulators prepare pilots for difficult situations. Storytelling has evolved, like other behaviors, to ensure our survival.
Drawing on the latest research in neuroscience, psychology, and evolutionary biology, Gottschall tells us what it means to be a storytelling animal. Did you know that the more absorbed you are in a story, the more it changes your behavior? That all children act out the same kinds of stories, whether they grow up in a slum or a suburb? That people who read more fiction are more empathetic?
Of course, our story instinct has a darker side. It makes us vulnerable to conspiracy theories, advertisements, and narratives about ourselves that are more "truthy" than true. National myths can also be terribly dangerous: Hitler's ambitions were partly fueled by a story. But as Gottschall shows in this remarkable book, stories can also change the world for the better. Most successful stories are moral - they teach us how to live, whether explicitly or implicitly, and bind us together around common values. We know we are master shapers of story. The Storytelling Animal finally reveals how stories shape us.
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In this witty and perceptive debut, a former editor at Psychology Today shows us how magical thinking makes life worth living. Psychologists have documented a litany of cognitive biases and explained their positive functions. Now, Matthew Hutson shows us that even the most hardcore skeptic indulges in magical thinking all the time - and it's crucial to our survival. Drawing on evolution, cognitive science, and neuroscience, Hutson shows us that magical thinking has been so useful to us that it's hardwired into our brains.
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Highly enjoyable
- By David R Pinsof on 05-01-12
By: Matthew Hutson
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Shock Value
- How a Few Eccentric Outsiders Gave Us Nightmares, Conquered Hollywood, and Invented Modern Horror
- By: Jason Zinoman
- Narrated by: Pete Larkin
- Length: 8 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Much has been written about the storied New Hollywood of the 1970s, but while Martin Scorsese, Steven Spielberg, and Francis Ford Coppola were making their first classic movies, a parallel universe of directors gave birth to the modern horror film - aggressive, raw, and utterly original. Based on unprecedented access to the genre's major players, New York Times critic Jason Zinoman's Shock Value delivers the first definitive account of horror's golden age.
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A good listen, but narrow in scope
- By Billy on 01-31-13
By: Jason Zinoman
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Batman Unauthorized
- Vigilantes, Jokers, and Heroes in Gotham City
- By: Dennis O'Neil - editor, Leah Wilson - editor
- Narrated by: Colby Elliott
- Length: 7 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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Compiled by a veteran writer of the comic series, this collection of essays explores Batman’s motivations and actions, as well as those of his foes. Batman is a creature of the night, more about vengeance than justice, more plagued by doubts than full of self-assurance, and more darkness than light. He has no superpowers, just skill, drive, and a really well-made suit.
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Eccentric Essays Batman!
- By arthur m ball on 10-24-14
By: Dennis O'Neil - editor, and others
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You Are Now Less Dumb
- How to Conquer Mob Mentality, How to Buy Happiness, and All the Other Ways to Outsmart Yourself
- By: David McRaney
- Narrated by: Don Hagen
- Length: 8 hrs and 40 mins
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You Are Now Less Dumb is grounded in the idea that we all believe ourselves to be objective observers of reality - except we’re not. But that's okay, because our delusions keep us sane. Expanding on this premise, McRaney provides eye-opening analyses of 15 more ways we fool ourselves every day. This smart and highly entertaining audiobook will be wowing listeners for years to come.
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Not a lot of guidance
- By A. Yoshida on 02-08-14
By: David McRaney
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Manhood for Amateurs
- The Pleasures and Regrets of a Husband, Father, and Son
- By: Michael Chabon
- Narrated by: Michael Chabon
- Length: 8 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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As a devoted son, as a passionate husband, and above all as a father, Chabon's memories of childhood, of his parents' marriage and divorce, of moments of painful adolescent comedy and giddy encounters with the popular art and literature of his own youth, are like a theme played by the mad quartet of which he now finds himself co-conductor. At once dazzling, hilarious, and moving, Manhood for Amateurs is destined to become a classic.
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Terrible
- By Ken on 10-14-09
By: Michael Chabon
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Fooling Houdini
- Magicians, Mentalists, Math Geeks, and the Hidden Powers of the Mind
- By: Alex Stone
- Narrated by: Alex Stone
- Length: 9 hrs and 14 mins
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When Alex Stone was five years old, his father bought him a magic kit - a gift that would spark a lifelong love. Years later, while living in New York City, he discovered a vibrant underground magic scene exploding with creativity and innovation and populated by a fascinating cast of characters: from his gruff mentor, who holds court in the back of a rundown pizza shop, to one of the world's greatest card cheats, who also happens to be blind. Captivated, he plunged headlong into this mysterious world.
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I suppose the author thinks he's clever
- By Joe on 11-01-12
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The Bonobo and the Atheist
- By: Frans de Waal
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
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In this lively and illuminating discussion of his landmark research, esteemed primatologist Frans de Waal argues that human morality is not imposed from above but instead comes from within. Moral behavior does not begin and end with religion but is in fact a product of evolution. For many years, de Waal has observed chimpanzees soothe distressed neighbors and bonobos share their food. Now he delivers fascinating fresh evidence for the seeds of ethical behavior in primate societies that further cements the case for the biological origins of human fairness.
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Great research on apes, bad research on humans
- By Christian Bonnell on 07-18-14
By: Frans de Waal
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At the Existentialist Café
- Freedom, Being, and Apricot Cocktails
- By: Sarah Bakewell
- Narrated by: Antonia Beamish
- Length: 14 hrs and 39 mins
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Paris, 1933: Three contemporaries meet over apricot cocktails at the Bec-de-Gaz bar on the rue Montparnasse. They are the young Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, and longtime friend Raymond Aron, a fellow philosopher who raves to them about a new conceptual framework from Berlin called phenomenology. "You see," he says, "if you are a phenomenologist, you can talk about this cocktail and make philosophy out of it!"
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Consistent look at incoherent philosophy
- By Gary on 06-19-16
By: Sarah Bakewell
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Bozo Sapiens
- Why to Err Is Human
- By: Michael Kaplan, Ellen Kaplan
- Narrated by: Victor Bevine
- Length: 9 hrs and 46 mins
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Our species, it appears, is hardwired to get things wrong in myriad different ways. Why did recipients of a loan offer accept a higher rate of interest when a pretty woman's face was printed on the flyer? Why did one poll on immigration find the most despised aliens were ones from a group that did not exist? What made four of the Air Force's best pilots fly their planes, in formation, straight into the ground?
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A tour de force
- By Ivan on 07-05-11
By: Michael Kaplan, and others
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The Horror of It All
- One Moviegoer’s Love Affair with Masked Maniacs, Frightened Virgins, and the Living Dead…
- By: Adam Rockoff
- Narrated by: R.C. Bray
- Length: 7 hrs and 7 mins
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The Horror of It All is a memoir from the front lines of the industry that dissects (and occasionally defends) the hugely popular phenomenon of scary movies. Author Adam Rockoff traces the highs and lows of the horror genre through the lens of his own obsessive fandom, born in the aisles of his local video store and nurtured with a steady diet of cable trash.
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Great book, if you were a teen in the 80's
- By Lila Fowler on 10-02-15
By: Adam Rockoff
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don't buy it.
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Why can humans alone invent? In The Pattern Seekers, Cambridge University psychologist Simon Baron-Cohen makes a case that autism is as crucial to our creative and cultural history as the mastery of fire. Indeed, Baron-Cohen argues that autistic people have played a key role in human progress for 70,000 years, from the first tools to the digital revolution. How? Because the same genes that cause autism enable the pattern seeking that is essential to our species' inventiveness.
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I made it about halfway through
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The Wayfinders
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Every culture is a unique answer to a fundamental question: What does it mean to be human and alive? In The Wayfinders, renowned anthropologist, winner of the prestigious Samuel Johnson Prize, and National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence Wade Davis leads us on a thrilling journey to celebrate the wisdom of the world's indigenous cultures.
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What listeners say about The Storytelling Animal
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Story
- Carole T.
- 10-04-12
It Was a Dark and Stormy Night...
We humans crave narratives. From ancient fire circles to books to radio and movies to TV sets, headphones, and computers, "story is the glue of human social life."
This short listen may not bring to light any really new concepts, but it offers interesting examples of how we use stories for education, entertainment, and reassurance that there is meaning in life. Gottschall also alerts us to reasons why we should be aware that this tendency also opens us up to the possibility of misinterpreting and being manipulated. We long for patterns and reasons - can conspiracy theories be far behind?
I especially enjoyed the discussion about ways in which new technologies are changing how we tell and experience stories -- from so-called "reality" shows to interactive and role-playing computer games.
The narrator is OK, but I wonder why he felt he had to deliver some quotes in quite bizarre accents. The book starts slowly but picks up in energy and interest as it goes along. I think most people interested in books and psychology will enjoy it.
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21 people found this helpful
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Story
- Diane
- 04-14-13
Making Sense of Life Through Stories
If you stop to think about it, stories are the framework around which we build our understanding of reality--whether the stories revolve around history, religion, myth, nationality, science, gaming, drama, fiction or our own lives.
This is Gottschall's premise and he makes his case pretty convincingly. The book does drag in parts and significant sections consist of summaries of materials covered in more depth in other books. However, unlike some other reviewers, I particularly enjoyed the sections on brain science and the role story plays in our dreams, in mental illness and in the development of human culture. In one example, the author contends that at root, the malaise of depression is the loss of our own story and the effectiveness of talk therapy is in helping us to rebuild our own personal narratives. Although the author doesn't take this step, one might argue that whenever a story loses its vitality, whether it is the story of a nation, culture or religion, it is only a matter of time before the demise of that institution inevitably follows.
Not surprisingly perhaps given his premise, the best parts of this book are in the stories. Narration is sub-par particularly when the narrator ineptly (and distractingly) attempts various accents.
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11 people found this helpful
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- Gael Dalton
- 01-01-22
Starts well, then derails
I was expecting a lot more about the history and tradition of storytelling, and maybe some more about mythology. What I got was a lot of canned Freudian theory with all of its potty-focus and repressed sexuality. I don't know why the author went in that direction, but I couldn't stomach the flip attitude and hyperfocus on what to me was irrelevancy.
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4 people found this helpful
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- nm1234
- 08-06-18
An okay book, an okay narration
I learned quite a bit from the book, but it needed more depth and more scholarly context.
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4 people found this helpful
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- Matthew r.
- 12-17-21
Surprisingly interesting read
I honestly got this book thinking that I would learn how to better tell stories. I was taken aback by how much depth the book went into the history, psychology, method, and adaption of our species and its need for story. While this book did not provide me with a blueprint for creating stories it has provided me with a new appreciation for the human mind, the need for story to teach better, and a deeper understanding of how other people may just be living their best life.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Blue Spark
- 08-01-19
Excellent book, idiosyncratic narrator
It’s an excellent book. The narrator had a few too many distracting mispronunciations (dropping the “L” in “wolf” or “werewolf”, and most irritatingly, pronouncing “experiment” like “experience” or “spearmint”). Once is odd, 20 times is a sin (where was the proofer/editor?!?)
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3 people found this helpful
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- MyticalC
- 12-16-19
A solid introduction
Most of this book is solid, it is a solid resource to get an overview and find more in-depth researchers. It has a fairly US centric bent and the final chapter and conclusions are a bit simplistic and preachy.
NOTE: No one in the games industry or around it says MMORPG as “more-peg,” whoever told the author they do was pulling their leg.
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- TJS
- 04-11-14
Nothing New
What disappointed you about The Storytelling Animal?
It was a rehash or compilation of a common understanding of narrative
What could Jonathan Gottschall have done to make this a more enjoyable book for you?
explored ideas instead of just regurgitating summaries of what was already known
What three words best describe Kris Koscheski’s performance?
Upbeat but monotonous
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- Szilard Pusztafalvi
- 10-28-20
Warning
Only read it if you are stable and have a plan of your future. And consult with a terapist. Good information if you able to take it.
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- Josh
- 04-10-20
Pretty good
Pretty good. Coalesces a number of fairly familiar ideas into insightful arguments and anecdotes .
As a writer I feel like this book gave breadth to the dimension of which I understand narrative.
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