The Edge of Memory

hardcover, 288 pages

English language

Published Jan. 7, 2019 by Bloomsbury Sigma.

ISBN:: 978-1-4729-4328-6

(1 review)

In today's society it is generally the written word that holds the authority. We are more likely to trust the words found in a history textbook over the version of history retold by a friend – after all, human memory is unreliable, and how can you be sure your friend hasn't embellished the facts? But before humans were writing down their knowledge, they were telling it to each other in the form of stories.

The Edge of Memory celebrates the predecessor of written information – the spoken word, tales from our ancestors that have been passed down, transmitting knowledge from one generation to the next. Among the most extensive and best-analysed of these stories are from native Australian cultures. These stories conveyed both practical information and recorded history, describing a lost landscape, often featuring tales of flooding and submergence. These folk traditions are increasingly supported by hard science. Geologists are …

In today's society it is generally the written word that holds the authority. We are more likely to trust the words found in a history textbook over the version of history retold by a friend – after all, human memory is unreliable, and how can you be sure your friend hasn't embellished the facts? But before humans were writing down their knowledge, they were telling it to each other in the form of stories.

The Edge of Memory celebrates the predecessor of written information – the spoken word, tales from our ancestors that have been passed down, transmitting knowledge from one generation to the next. Among the most extensive and best-analysed of these stories are from native Australian cultures. These stories conveyed both practical information and recorded history, describing a lost landscape, often featuring tales of flooding and submergence. These folk traditions are increasingly supported by hard science. Geologists are starting to corroborate the tales through study of climatic data, sediments and land forms; the evidence was there in the stories, but until recently, nobody was listening.

In this book, Patrick Nunn unravels the importance of these tales, exploring the science behind folk history from various places – including northwest Europe and India – and what it can tell us about environmental phenomena, from coastal drowning to volcanic eruptions. These stories of real events were passed across the generations, and over thousands of years, and they have broad implications for our understanding of how human societies have developed through the millennia, and ultimately how we respond collectively to changes in climate, our surroundings and the environment we live in.

4 editions

Llaverac reviewed The Edge of Memory by Patrick Nunn

So much geology

3 stars

This book is about indigenous stories that were passed on orally, for millennia sometimes, and that recount ancient geologic events (volcanic eruptions, dramatic sea level rises that engulfed coastal cities, islands that suddenly disappeared...), generally disguised as tales, probably because it made them easier to remember and pass to the next generation.

On one hand it's fascinating to think that peoples have been able to retain the memory of events that happened maybe 10 000 years ago, or that - at the coldest time of the last ice age - the global sea level was ~120m lower than it is today, which gave some parts of the world a very different geography. On the other hand, some chapters just felt like long lists of stories that were actually describing a certain kind of geologic event. I would have liked to learn more about how these stories were transmitted, and not …

This book is about indigenous stories that were passed on orally, for millennia sometimes, and that recount ancient geologic events (volcanic eruptions, dramatic sea level rises that engulfed coastal cities, islands that suddenly disappeared...), generally disguised as tales, probably because it made them easier to remember and pass to the next generation.

On one hand it's fascinating to think that peoples have been able to retain the memory of events that happened maybe 10 000 years ago, or that - at the coldest time of the last ice age - the global sea level was ~120m lower than it is today, which gave some parts of the world a very different geography. On the other hand, some chapters just felt like long lists of stories that were actually describing a certain kind of geologic event. I would have liked to learn more about how these stories were transmitted, and not just what they told: there are a few passages on the how, but most of the book is about tectonic plates, rising sea levels and the ice age.

I guess that if you want to make the case that Western science should pay more attention to indigenous stories and traditional knowledge, you better come up with a lot of evidence, and that's exactly what this book does, but I'm afraid it's not particularly thrilling to read. A longform piece would have been largely enough for me.