Unspeakable

A personal study of silence . . . As a teenager, Harriet Shawcross stopped speaking for a year. Her attempt to make sense of that experience investigates the essence of language itself . . . Part memoir, part investigative journalism, Unspeakable is a deeply felt attempt at making sense of this period in her life, and of how others manage when words fail them . . . [A] compassionate book * * Guardian * *
Extremely affecting . . . Shawcross writes eloquently . . . Caring, inquisitive -- Stuart Kelly * * Scotsman * *
Elegant . . . Shawcross can certainly write * * Observer * *
Shawcross has set herself the challenge of exploring these wordless moments in order to examine how silence moulds our personalities and shapes our lives . . . A compelling idea . . . well-told and engaging * * Mail on Sunday * *
History and investigative journalism fuse in a book that speaks beautifully about the effect of simply refusing to speak . . . It's bracing to read a book that speaks so beautifully of the power of silence for both unhinging and healing. Ditto sex. Ditto love * * Financial Times * *
There is a lot of fascinating material here, from meeting an artist who turned speechlessness into a six-month project . . . to the story of George Oppen, the objectivist poet who ceased writing amid the McCarthyist churn of postwar America * * Sunday Times * *
The things we find 'unspeakable' are the subject of Harriet Shawcross's fascinating book * * Daily Mail * *
What a fascinating subject to have been chosen by a journalist . . . The book as it stands is a pleasure to read, choosing to take the reader towards an examination of the power, both positive and perilous, of silence * * Evening Gazette * *
Explores what makes us silent, from the aftermath of natural disaster to the taboo of coming out. A heady mix of memoir, history, literary criticism and journalism * * Sunday Post * *
Shawcross looks at the ways in which breaking a silence can be healing . . . Unspeakable is engaging and informative . . . Thought-provoking * * Saturday Paper * *