R/I ~ AA
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Empathy and imagination help us to engage when we enjoy a book or an audiobook – but why do we feel so sad when we come to the end? Howard Timberlake survives the post-book blues.
n recent weeks my world has been tainted by a break-up… I’ve ended a month-long relationship with Billy Connolly, the much-loved Scottish comedian – via my audiobook app. I’ve spent hours listening to Billy reading his life story – his comedy, his music, his love of digestive biscuits, and I’m not sure what I’m going to do without his lilting Scottish tones. It was the same with past audio-based chums: Dave Grohl, Peter Frampton, Barack Obama, Roger Daltrey.
This “post-book blues” thing is a side-effect that doesn’t seem to get mentioned much, if at all. It’s not an in-person relationship as such, but it is one forged in a unique, unwritten contract with the reader or listener – signed by your subconscious when turning to the first page, or hitting “play”.
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Bijal Shah, a bibliotherapist and author, is like a literary version of a matchmaker and counselling service in one – helping her clients find books that aid their mental well-being. According to Shah, the post-audiobook blues might be a hint of something innately human. “That is very, very common. It’s a sense of loss that you feel at the end [of a book] and you’re grieving. It’s like saying goodbye to so many friends you’ve made, because you’ve got to know this person over the course of the book and now there’s no more connection, and this is why sequels do so well – it’s that continuity.”
FoundingFrog
Article URL : https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20220506-how-our-brains-work-when-we-love-a-book-or-audiobook