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The Man Who Tasted Shapes
In this medical detective adventure, Cytowic shows how synesthesia, or "joined sensation," illuminates a wide swath of mental life and leads to a new view of what it means to be human. Richard Cytowic's dinner host apologized, "There aren't enough points on the chicken!" He felt flavor also as a physical shape in his hands, and the chicken had come out "too round." This offbeat comment in 1980 launched Cytowic's exploration into the oddity called synesthesia. He is one of the few world authorities on the subject. Sharing a root with anesthesia ("no sensation"), synesthesia means "joined sensation," whereby a voice, for example, is not only heard but also seen, felt, or tasted. The trait is involuntary, hereditary, and fairly common. It stayed a scientific mystery for two centuries until Cytowic's original experiments led to a neurological explanation—and to a new concept of brain organization that accentuates emotion over reason. That chicken dinner two decades ago led Cytowic to explore a deeper reality that, he argues, exists in everyone but is often just below the surface of awareness (which is why finding meaning in our lives can be elusive). In this medical detective adventure, Cytowic shows how synesthesia, far from being a mere curiosity, illuminates a wide swath of mental life and leads to a new view of what is means to be human—a view that turns upside down conventional ideas about reason, emotional knowledge, and self-understanding. This 2003 edition features a new afterword.
296 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1993
41 people are currently reading
4415 people want to read
About the author
Richard E. Cytowic
12 books105 followersRichard E. Cytowic, MD, MFA is a neurologist best know for bringing synesthesia back into the scientific mainstream in 1980. The trait of crossed senses is now seen as important to understanding how brains perceive.
Wednesday Is Indigo Blue: Discovering the Brain of Synesthesia (with David Eagleman) won the 2011 Montaigne Medal.
Cytowic also writes non-fiction and fiction, and received his MFA in creative writing from American University. The Pulitzer nominee's work has appeared in The Washingtonian, New Scientist, and the New York Times Magazine.
His Blog at Psychology Today is The Fallible Mind: Emotion, perception, and other tricks of the brain
Wednesday Is Indigo Blue: Discovering the Brain of Synesthesia (with David Eagleman) won the 2011 Montaigne Medal.
Cytowic also writes non-fiction and fiction, and received his MFA in creative writing from American University. The Pulitzer nominee's work has appeared in The Washingtonian, New Scientist, and the New York Times Magazine.
His Blog at Psychology Today is The Fallible Mind: Emotion, perception, and other tricks of the brain
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 62 reviews
July 25, 2016
When I read the summary on the back cover I thought "This is me!" I picked it up immediately. Up until then I had assumed that everyone saw colors with numbers, and feeling different physical sensations attached to tastes was just the way people tasted things. It was interesting seeing the phenomenon from another person's perspective, and validating my own.
There are times when I feel more alive - my senses are wide open and they blend together into an overwhelming experience. It's similar to taking a pair of goggles off and enjoying the expansion of your peripheral vision. When doing math, the numbers have strong associations to colors and I can remember them and how they relate to each other. While walking through the garden, or standing in the shopping mall, or cooking, scents and tastes impart a sense of shape and geometry that invites me to stop and savor the edges and textures of the experience. It has become one of those perks in life that I enjoy, but until I found this book I thought it was commonplace and unnamed.
I understand the consensus that there are no universal norms between synesthetes, but I totally get the example from the introduction - the subject remarking that there aren't enough "points on the chicken". If I'm cooking and the food isn't seasoned enough, it feels too smooth. Adding salt gives it a taste-texture like very coarse sandpaper; and if there is too much salt, I get a sharply jagged feeling that blocks out the flavor of the food. When I eat tomatoes from the store, they taste bland and give the impression of running, glassy water; but garden-fresh tomatoes are taught like a wire, with a delightful dip at the end like the curve of an ice cream spoon; and if you add the scent of tomato leaves it multiplies the effect, like the tomato is gently suspended by a thousand tiny spirals of narrow-gauge wire - tangy, complex, and tightly wound.
When doing math in school I see the colors of each number. A two or three-digit number is a few splotches of color, like a Rothko painting, that sometimes resolves into a scene, but usually it's just the first and last digits that stick out. Sometimes I'll confuse one number with another - for example, 7 is a crimson red while 9 is more burgundy, and I'll sometimes switch the two and say seven when I mean nine.
In the book, the subject feels it most strongly when under the influence of alcohol. I don't drink, but usually I feel it more strongly when I'm not under stress.
Even though I'm usually reluctant to talk about it, when someone else mentions synesthesia I feel threatened, as if they read about it somewhere and are pretending they have it too; or maybe I'm just pretending...better smell a candle or do some math problems just to be sure.
There are times when I feel more alive - my senses are wide open and they blend together into an overwhelming experience. It's similar to taking a pair of goggles off and enjoying the expansion of your peripheral vision. When doing math, the numbers have strong associations to colors and I can remember them and how they relate to each other. While walking through the garden, or standing in the shopping mall, or cooking, scents and tastes impart a sense of shape and geometry that invites me to stop and savor the edges and textures of the experience. It has become one of those perks in life that I enjoy, but until I found this book I thought it was commonplace and unnamed.
I understand the consensus that there are no universal norms between synesthetes, but I totally get the example from the introduction - the subject remarking that there aren't enough "points on the chicken". If I'm cooking and the food isn't seasoned enough, it feels too smooth. Adding salt gives it a taste-texture like very coarse sandpaper; and if there is too much salt, I get a sharply jagged feeling that blocks out the flavor of the food. When I eat tomatoes from the store, they taste bland and give the impression of running, glassy water; but garden-fresh tomatoes are taught like a wire, with a delightful dip at the end like the curve of an ice cream spoon; and if you add the scent of tomato leaves it multiplies the effect, like the tomato is gently suspended by a thousand tiny spirals of narrow-gauge wire - tangy, complex, and tightly wound.
When doing math in school I see the colors of each number. A two or three-digit number is a few splotches of color, like a Rothko painting, that sometimes resolves into a scene, but usually it's just the first and last digits that stick out. Sometimes I'll confuse one number with another - for example, 7 is a crimson red while 9 is more burgundy, and I'll sometimes switch the two and say seven when I mean nine.
In the book, the subject feels it most strongly when under the influence of alcohol. I don't drink, but usually I feel it more strongly when I'm not under stress.
Even though I'm usually reluctant to talk about it, when someone else mentions synesthesia I feel threatened, as if they read about it somewhere and are pretending they have it too; or maybe I'm just pretending...better smell a candle or do some math problems just to be sure.
November 1, 2007
The = tastes like dry chicken
Man = tastes like chipped beef gravy on toast
Who = tastes like turkey
Tasted = orange kool aid
Shapes = swiss cheese
It's somewhat dry, but gives you decent insight on a little thing I have called "synesthesia."
Man = tastes like chipped beef gravy on toast
Who = tastes like turkey
Tasted = orange kool aid
Shapes = swiss cheese
It's somewhat dry, but gives you decent insight on a little thing I have called "synesthesia."
July 14, 2008
Cytowic spends way too much time talking about himself (the hero who dares to study synesthesia) and his convinction that "people" think medicine and science are all about machines. And he goes on about this... Synesthesia was what I was interested in, and there's not enough of it in this book.
December 4, 2007
this book changed my self-perception...until i read it i had no idea that there was a name for the condition (gift, oddity...) i have wherein i hear colors and why i always questioned how the makers of certain items (like toys when i was little) could color them - let's say green - when the word sounded so obviously blue!
Or why a siren in the distance was painfully red and the locomotive down the line had such a soothing, velvety feel to it.
Anyway - good read for curious minds who want to know more about "synesthesia".
Or why a siren in the distance was painfully red and the locomotive down the line had such a soothing, velvety feel to it.
Anyway - good read for curious minds who want to know more about "synesthesia".
December 15, 2008
Very interesting book about synesthesia (the mixing of sense, like tasting shapes or sensing numbers as having colors). Though it is not as well written, folks who like Oliver Sacks books will find this interesting. Synesthesia is a true phenomenon though relatively rare and this book if a non-fiction book about a variety of interesting synesthetes.
September 21, 2022
This is instantly one of my new favorite books. Not only does it address the science behind one of my favorite medical oddities, but Cytowic is a poet. This is one of those precious books that reminds me why I loved biology in school, and why I find the life sciences to be so crucial to my development as a thinking person. Part 1 is what the book advertises, but presented with such compassion, curiousity, and intimacy that it's better than I could have hoped from a synopsis such as is given us. Part 2 has me breathless, because it's like Cytowic reached into my head and my heart and properly articulated how I feel about the ideas of science and religion, and how they are not separate in any of us, and when an individual tries to separate them, they become the real monstrous scientists fiction warned us about, devoid of heart, morals, and humanity. Even better, Cytowic's part 2, which consists of 11 short essays, aligned some common platitudes about emotional wellbeing in such a way that I finally understand how I might make use of them - meditation, accepting what I cannot change, using rational thinking WITH my emotions, not against them. All of this as the result of a career of exploring, discovering, and most importantly, treating those who see things differently like the people they are.
Five stars isn't enough, and it's a damn shame this book is out of print. Cytowic put out a new book recently, which I want to read next.
Five stars isn't enough, and it's a damn shame this book is out of print. Cytowic put out a new book recently, which I want to read next.
November 27, 2016
When I was thirteen, I remember asking my mother: “Mom, what color is the number 3?” She looked at me, not understanding the question: “What do you mean, what color is number 3?” I repeated it to my father and my younger sister, but they didn’t understand either. “Does it have to be of any particular color?” “Why, it’s yellow, of course.” At that age, I dismissed the whole incident as an oddity of sorts.
Years later, I was browsing the mighty internet when I came across the word synesthesia , and that's how I discovered that I may be one of the many cases of grapheme-color synesthetes that nobody knew about. That is, I perceived each digit with a particular color, and also some letters of the alphabet. It felt good to be different, and to be acknowledged.
Well, some time afterwards, I started looking for an explanation to my irrational fear of on-screen violence. It was almost an organic sensation which made me run out of the room until the scene was over. For example, if one of the characters was threatened with a knife to his neck, I couldn’t help touching my own neck and wince. What was interesting was that my only problem was when people were hurt, or obviously in pain. When people asked me why I can’t watch violent movies, I told them that “I feel like all those bad things are done to me”. By another improbable coincidence, I came across the following paragraph on Wikipedia:
Mirror-touch synesthesia is a condition which causes individuals to experience the same sensation (such as touch) that another person feels. […]Mirror touch responses are not limited to feeling touch. Mirror touch synesthetes have a higher ability to feel empathy than non-synesthetes, and can therefore feel the same emotions that someone else may be observed to feel.[6] Additionally, some individuals experience pain when observing someone else in pain, and this is a condition usually developed from birth. Approximately 30% of the normal population experience some form of this condition and so on. Well, wasn’t that certainly interesting?
My third experience with this term happened when, one morning, I got increasingly frustrated, as usual, by my sister’s loud chewing. It always made me angry for some reason, although she was not doing it on purpose. She showed me then this article on Facebook about a condition called misophonia, which, guess what, is thought to be a form of synesthesia, a correlation between sound and emotion. I recalled various experiences when I got nervous because of various repetitive sounds, like bird calls or the creaking of water pipes. I couldn’t sleep for hours because of a little bird chirping once at every ten seconds outside my window, or because of the ticking of my watch, or even if someone breathed regularly next to me. It’s amazing how many things are overlooked every day.
So obviously, when I found a book about synesthesia, I had to read it. And it didn’t disappoint. Mister Cytowic is a very open-minded scientist, unlike most. He doesn’t buy the objectivity bullshit. In fact, he doesn’t believe in objective scientists or even objective humans for that matter, because subjectivity is what makes us human, and most probably, humane. Here’s a quote:
"Persons who believe they act rationally are experts at deluding themselves. What they are really doing is rationalizing their emotions. [...] Can the savagery of religious and ethnic wars support the empty contention that such disputes are based on rational facts?
"The situation in the Middle East and across Eastern Europe is complex," Clark interjected.
"I agree. But that complexity leads back to all the intellectual somersaults and political posturing that are necessary to rationalize intense hatred."
To sum up, Richard is as much of a philosopher as he is a scientist, and even if you don’t have an ongoing interest in neuroscience, this is a most interesting read.
Years later, I was browsing the mighty internet when I came across the word synesthesia , and that's how I discovered that I may be one of the many cases of grapheme-color synesthetes that nobody knew about. That is, I perceived each digit with a particular color, and also some letters of the alphabet. It felt good to be different, and to be acknowledged.
Well, some time afterwards, I started looking for an explanation to my irrational fear of on-screen violence. It was almost an organic sensation which made me run out of the room until the scene was over. For example, if one of the characters was threatened with a knife to his neck, I couldn’t help touching my own neck and wince. What was interesting was that my only problem was when people were hurt, or obviously in pain. When people asked me why I can’t watch violent movies, I told them that “I feel like all those bad things are done to me”. By another improbable coincidence, I came across the following paragraph on Wikipedia:
Mirror-touch synesthesia is a condition which causes individuals to experience the same sensation (such as touch) that another person feels. […]Mirror touch responses are not limited to feeling touch. Mirror touch synesthetes have a higher ability to feel empathy than non-synesthetes, and can therefore feel the same emotions that someone else may be observed to feel.[6] Additionally, some individuals experience pain when observing someone else in pain, and this is a condition usually developed from birth. Approximately 30% of the normal population experience some form of this condition and so on. Well, wasn’t that certainly interesting?
My third experience with this term happened when, one morning, I got increasingly frustrated, as usual, by my sister’s loud chewing. It always made me angry for some reason, although she was not doing it on purpose. She showed me then this article on Facebook about a condition called misophonia, which, guess what, is thought to be a form of synesthesia, a correlation between sound and emotion. I recalled various experiences when I got nervous because of various repetitive sounds, like bird calls or the creaking of water pipes. I couldn’t sleep for hours because of a little bird chirping once at every ten seconds outside my window, or because of the ticking of my watch, or even if someone breathed regularly next to me. It’s amazing how many things are overlooked every day.
So obviously, when I found a book about synesthesia, I had to read it. And it didn’t disappoint. Mister Cytowic is a very open-minded scientist, unlike most. He doesn’t buy the objectivity bullshit. In fact, he doesn’t believe in objective scientists or even objective humans for that matter, because subjectivity is what makes us human, and most probably, humane. Here’s a quote:
"Persons who believe they act rationally are experts at deluding themselves. What they are really doing is rationalizing their emotions. [...] Can the savagery of religious and ethnic wars support the empty contention that such disputes are based on rational facts?
"The situation in the Middle East and across Eastern Europe is complex," Clark interjected.
"I agree. But that complexity leads back to all the intellectual somersaults and political posturing that are necessary to rationalize intense hatred."
To sum up, Richard is as much of a philosopher as he is a scientist, and even if you don’t have an ongoing interest in neuroscience, this is a most interesting read.
August 8, 2009
This book is about synesthesia, a condition where certain people link senses together in an unexpected way. For example, one of the two main cases in this book tastes shapes, the other has colored hearing. This book is part textbook, part autobiography, and part editorial. It is divided into two sections. The first, larger section concentrates on synesthesia itself and Cytowic's interest in it, and the second part is a series of essays on the importance of emotion over reason.
Cytowic alternates chapters between recounted personal experiences, starting with his own childhood, and more technical chapters about brain function and synesthesia as well as other neurological conditions. I actually liked the back and forth approach, it brings Cytowic's knowledge and enthusiasm about synesthesia to a personal level. While some of the technical parts were a little above me, he definitely tried to thoroughly explain concepts so that the lay person could understand them. He also includes helpful graphs and charts. I also enjoyed his brief but interesting account on the relationship between art/music and synesthesia.
For all that I liked about this book, there was just as much I didn't like. Cytowic has EXTREMELY strong opinions, and doesn't hold back in telling you about them. For example, he basically hates anything to do with medical machines, hates modern doctors who do tests, and just seems to hate medical technology in general (he even had bad things to say about the stethoscope!). He also makes sweeping generalizations about non-religious people, who apparently are all scientists, and "spiritual people," of which he is one. He often adopts a tone of superiority about these things, and comes off extremely pompous. Many of his points rely on his picture of the world as purely black and white.
My other complaint is that Cytowic can be very redundant. He not only makes the same points over and over again (especially in the essays of part two), but frequently uses the same exact metaphors. Not a huge faux pas, but a little annoying nonetheless.
In general, if you discount his digressions, this is an interesting way to look at synesthesia, especially if you are looking for an alternative to purely textbook material (although if you ARE looking for a textbook devoted entirely to synesthesia, Cytowic does not fail to mention numerous times that he in fact has written one!).
Cytowic alternates chapters between recounted personal experiences, starting with his own childhood, and more technical chapters about brain function and synesthesia as well as other neurological conditions. I actually liked the back and forth approach, it brings Cytowic's knowledge and enthusiasm about synesthesia to a personal level. While some of the technical parts were a little above me, he definitely tried to thoroughly explain concepts so that the lay person could understand them. He also includes helpful graphs and charts. I also enjoyed his brief but interesting account on the relationship between art/music and synesthesia.
For all that I liked about this book, there was just as much I didn't like. Cytowic has EXTREMELY strong opinions, and doesn't hold back in telling you about them. For example, he basically hates anything to do with medical machines, hates modern doctors who do tests, and just seems to hate medical technology in general (he even had bad things to say about the stethoscope!). He also makes sweeping generalizations about non-religious people, who apparently are all scientists, and "spiritual people," of which he is one. He often adopts a tone of superiority about these things, and comes off extremely pompous. Many of his points rely on his picture of the world as purely black and white.
My other complaint is that Cytowic can be very redundant. He not only makes the same points over and over again (especially in the essays of part two), but frequently uses the same exact metaphors. Not a huge faux pas, but a little annoying nonetheless.
In general, if you discount his digressions, this is an interesting way to look at synesthesia, especially if you are looking for an alternative to purely textbook material (although if you ARE looking for a textbook devoted entirely to synesthesia, Cytowic does not fail to mention numerous times that he in fact has written one!).
May 19, 2012
I have to admit, this is not the type of book I would normally be drawn to. 'The Man Who Tasted Shapes' is a good title - because if I had seen this book on a shelf with the title 'Synaesthesia: An Introduction,' or 'Understanding Synaesthesia,' I would probably have lightly fingered the book and then my dainty little fingers would've found something else to finger.
But...it was a really interesting book, an introduction to a condition that I didn't even know existed. I can't admit to understanding it all (my brain just doesn't work like that) but what I liked about the book was, as well as the theoretical detail, there was a diary/'journey like' discovery to the writing and Richard's voice jumped from the page.
So, in the end, this book definitely was worth fingering.
But...it was a really interesting book, an introduction to a condition that I didn't even know existed. I can't admit to understanding it all (my brain just doesn't work like that) but what I liked about the book was, as well as the theoretical detail, there was a diary/'journey like' discovery to the writing and Richard's voice jumped from the page.
So, in the end, this book definitely was worth fingering.
August 1, 2010
Half interesting, half very dry and occasionally boring. Richard Cytowic is obviously very interested in synaesthesia - what causes it, how it is manifested in different people, whether or not you can track it by scanning the brain etc. - but his book isn't really meant for non-medical readers. I was fascinated by the experiments and the discoveries, but there was a LOT of medical babble that I had no interest in at all, and ended up just skimming.
A non-fiction that reads too much like a textbook for me to enjoy it as "casual reading".
A non-fiction that reads too much like a textbook for me to enjoy it as "casual reading".
December 1, 2019
This book is all over the place in content and absolutely unbearable in form.
April 27, 2018
Another one bites the dust! I've had this book on my to-read list basically since I joined Goodreads, so it feels so nice to get it off of there!
So, the first 2/3rds of this book focuses on synesthesia, an interesting phenomenon where a person's senses are intertwined. Each person is individual, so one person might taste shapes, as in the title of the book, whereas another may see colors in connection to sounds, or taste different colors. Which is interesting, but maybe not enough to carry a book, at least for me. I enjoyed the book, but I definitely had a couple issues with it.
Part of this was stylistic. There are a lot of conversations in here, and it's kind of weird in a nonfiction book. I appreciate that Cytowic is illustrating how things happened, but the conversations just felt strange and stilted. The age of the book also works against it. There's a lot of time spent explaining theories that are old enough that I never learned them in the first place, which felt like time wasted for me.
On the other hand, there's a lot to like. Cytowic's got a brilliant mind, and it's fascinating to see how it works. It's also really interesting to learn more about that time and the climate in the medical field. Behaviorism was really strong at the time, so it's fun to see how Cytowic deals with that. I also really liked the essays at the end of the book, which range through a variety of topics, many of which still feel pretty current.
In sum, an enjoyable work that didn't blow me away, but that I don't regret spending my time on.
So, the first 2/3rds of this book focuses on synesthesia, an interesting phenomenon where a person's senses are intertwined. Each person is individual, so one person might taste shapes, as in the title of the book, whereas another may see colors in connection to sounds, or taste different colors. Which is interesting, but maybe not enough to carry a book, at least for me. I enjoyed the book, but I definitely had a couple issues with it.
Part of this was stylistic. There are a lot of conversations in here, and it's kind of weird in a nonfiction book. I appreciate that Cytowic is illustrating how things happened, but the conversations just felt strange and stilted. The age of the book also works against it. There's a lot of time spent explaining theories that are old enough that I never learned them in the first place, which felt like time wasted for me.
On the other hand, there's a lot to like. Cytowic's got a brilliant mind, and it's fascinating to see how it works. It's also really interesting to learn more about that time and the climate in the medical field. Behaviorism was really strong at the time, so it's fun to see how Cytowic deals with that. I also really liked the essays at the end of the book, which range through a variety of topics, many of which still feel pretty current.
In sum, an enjoyable work that didn't blow me away, but that I don't regret spending my time on.
July 10, 2023
This book is written more like a memoir than a medical journal, which makes for much easier reading. Cytowic seems to be the authority on writing about synesthesia, and his books really are a pleasure to experience, especially if you're truly interested in the topic. I have read several books by the author and I have never been disappointed, learning new information every single time.
Some of my favorite passages from the book:
"Sensory incontinence suggested that the nervous energy associated with one sense leaks to another part of the brain, much as a puddle of water sloshes about in a rocking boat."
"Good fiction totally absorbs the reader's mind, dissolving the real environment in which the reader holds the book."
"We refuse to trust what we cannot see with our own eyes, so we either resist change or try to force it to happen now. We tear open the cocoon to see the butterfly, pry open the rosebud to smell the blossom, and ruin both so that there is nothing left to savor."
"Water is an ancient symbol of the unconscious. The waves of its ocean break on the shore of our awareness."
Some of my favorite passages from the book:
"Sensory incontinence suggested that the nervous energy associated with one sense leaks to another part of the brain, much as a puddle of water sloshes about in a rocking boat."
"Good fiction totally absorbs the reader's mind, dissolving the real environment in which the reader holds the book."
"We refuse to trust what we cannot see with our own eyes, so we either resist change or try to force it to happen now. We tear open the cocoon to see the butterfly, pry open the rosebud to smell the blossom, and ruin both so that there is nothing left to savor."
"Water is an ancient symbol of the unconscious. The waves of its ocean break on the shore of our awareness."
January 20, 2012
Synesthesia is a fascinating condition wherein the senses are seemingly confused. You can hear colors and see sounds and all kinds of odd combinations of smell, sight, hearing, taste and touch. I have to say, I'm a little jealous of people with this condition. It's not something I can relate to at all but it sounds kind of amazing.
If you're at all interested in this condition by all means read this book. Just keep in mind a few things. While there are moments when Cytowic clearly want to be a writer and tell a story the book reads much more like a textbook. It truly is about the science of the brain and how synesthesia sheds a whole new light on brain functionality. Cytowic admits within the book that he is torn between being an artist and a doctor. He also attempts to be a philosopher. Personally, I think the doctor side of him clearly wins. The book is dense and without a background in neurology may fall flat to most readers.
I was completely interested and wanted to take a nap at the same time. I guess that's my version of synesthesia.
If you're at all interested in this condition by all means read this book. Just keep in mind a few things. While there are moments when Cytowic clearly want to be a writer and tell a story the book reads much more like a textbook. It truly is about the science of the brain and how synesthesia sheds a whole new light on brain functionality. Cytowic admits within the book that he is torn between being an artist and a doctor. He also attempts to be a philosopher. Personally, I think the doctor side of him clearly wins. The book is dense and without a background in neurology may fall flat to most readers.
I was completely interested and wanted to take a nap at the same time. I guess that's my version of synesthesia.
November 19, 2008
I don't have synesthesia, but was drawn to read about it because it made sense to me. As an artist, I often relate colors to certain words, and shapes to tastes or sensations. In my
case, this is a conscious conceptual choice. For people with synesthesia, it's inescapable
reality. A cross-connection in the five senses causes them to see or taste a song, feel the shape of a flavor, hear the sound of a table.
I'm fascinated by this multi-dimensional sense perception and wish I had it for real -
though most synesthetes conceal their condition/gift for fear of being considered crazy.
The book is written by a layman who became aware of synesthesia when invited to dinner by
a synesthete. He relates his personal experience in pursuing the subject in an interesting and accessible way, and also relates the science behind our current understanding of the condition.
case, this is a conscious conceptual choice. For people with synesthesia, it's inescapable
reality. A cross-connection in the five senses causes them to see or taste a song, feel the shape of a flavor, hear the sound of a table.
I'm fascinated by this multi-dimensional sense perception and wish I had it for real -
though most synesthetes conceal their condition/gift for fear of being considered crazy.
The book is written by a layman who became aware of synesthesia when invited to dinner by
a synesthete. He relates his personal experience in pursuing the subject in an interesting and accessible way, and also relates the science behind our current understanding of the condition.
July 13, 2015
I read this back in 2004 after my daughter told me that she has synesthesia. While we now regard it as a fun parlor trick, her description (before we knew there was a word for it) literally made me wonder if I needed to commit her for mental illness.
So I was quite relieved to read Richard Cytowic's informative and enjoyable book about the condition. I say enjoyable based on reading every other chapter. Those were the ones with anecdotes, aimed at the regular reader. The other chapters were highly technical in a way that neither interested or appealed to me. And the book told me what I needed to know with out them. So it all worked out.
Highly recommended for anyone with questions about this interesting brain situation.
So I was quite relieved to read Richard Cytowic's informative and enjoyable book about the condition. I say enjoyable based on reading every other chapter. Those were the ones with anecdotes, aimed at the regular reader. The other chapters were highly technical in a way that neither interested or appealed to me. And the book told me what I needed to know with out them. So it all worked out.
Highly recommended for anyone with questions about this interesting brain situation.
April 5, 2008
This non-fiction book delves mostly into the condition known as synesthesia where two senses are intertwined. Someone who has this fascinating condition may see colors when music is played or have smell and sight combined. The book gets its title from the fact that the author had been invited to someone's home for dinner. When the host went to check on the chicken, he came back and said it wasn't done because there were not enough points on the chicken. He could literally "see" when the meal was fully cooked. This incident piqued the author's interest and he started to find out more about this very rare condition. He writes about synesthesia and a few other conditions and shows how the intricate workings of the human brain are beyond imagination.
February 8, 2015
An easy book to read, with all the scientific language explained without being over-simplified, this presents one of the first studies on the condition of synesthesia. Cytowic writes it as a contextualised story, including his life at the time of the studies and his conversations with his colleagues and mentors. At the end there are 11 short essays on topics connected to the way we perceive the brain, the mind and consciousness, and the relationship between science and the arts, both culturally and psychologically.
It's a well-written book, though there are a few too many repetitions of ideas - there are whole sentences lifted from one chapter and pasted into another. That is not a problem for the reading process, so it can be ignored.
It's a well-written book, though there are a few too many repetitions of ideas - there are whole sentences lifted from one chapter and pasted into another. That is not a problem for the reading process, so it can be ignored.
September 29, 2014
I read this book to learn more about synesthesia as I have it myself. I did learn more about it, but through this book I also learnt more about perception as a whole. I personally like that the author puts an importance over people's individual experience more than just what machines say or tests indicate. It wasn't until recently that I even realised that not everyone put colours with words as well as other things that are normal to me. There's too many people out there that believe they have all the answers rather than listening and being curious.
March 12, 2015
Good, but very technical
I thought this would be a good book to understand synethesia for other people. The amount of the book spent describing the synethethe's experience was miniscule in comparison to the incredibly technical information that is really only of interest to neurologists. Without a strong background in science I wouldn't have made it through this book at all. I'm very glad to know the biological underpinnings of my synethesia...but I would have preferred to read how other people live with it.
I thought this would be a good book to understand synethesia for other people. The amount of the book spent describing the synethethe's experience was miniscule in comparison to the incredibly technical information that is really only of interest to neurologists. Without a strong background in science I wouldn't have made it through this book at all. I'm very glad to know the biological underpinnings of my synethesia...but I would have preferred to read how other people live with it.
October 2, 2014
Brilliant book about the condition that is synesthesia, but you additionally end up learning a lot about how the mind works in general. The writing gets a bit more scientific than story sometimes but if you're ok with that, I'd recommend it, even if just for the fascinating knowledge contained within.
September 21, 2012
"If you want to learn new things, you should try reading new books."
Interesting book, but I didn't finish it (I got to page 60). I would have liked it better if it had focused more on people with synesthesia, and maybe the book did, but I just didn't get to that part.
Interesting book, but I didn't finish it (I got to page 60). I would have liked it better if it had focused more on people with synesthesia, and maybe the book did, but I just didn't get to that part.
March 25, 2015
This book is endlessly boring despite a fascinating subject matter. Kind of a shame. Or maybe it just wasn't a book to try to read before bed.
May 21, 2017
This book is well written and it's got a great story to tell. I read it as an assignment for my Communications research class and did not dread reading it, unlike most books I am assigned to read. I finished it in two days and I'd say it's a great book for us people in the modern day. It follows a researcher (actually, I'm pretty sure he's like a doctor or something, but I don't remember the specifics) who comes into contact with a guy with synesthesia, and gets frustrated when no one believes that the man he met can taste shapes. His fellow doctors (which is, I'm sure how refers to them) all want machines and stuff to define their patients, because it's such an accepted form of diagnosis. This book is a good read in an age where we can't understand people as they are because our paradigms of identifying them are construed based on non-human things.
I've decided to rate this book three stars not because it was average, or bad, or because it wasn't well written. I rated it this way because the story was just okay, and because I wouldn't have read it if it weren't for an assignment. Plus, I'm more of a fantasy type of guy to begin with, and this is non-fiction. Actually I think it's more like biography, or history, because it actually happened. But yeah, I like fantasies, like Redwall, a lot more.
I've decided to rate this book three stars not because it was average, or bad, or because it wasn't well written. I rated it this way because the story was just okay, and because I wouldn't have read it if it weren't for an assignment. Plus, I'm more of a fantasy type of guy to begin with, and this is non-fiction. Actually I think it's more like biography, or history, because it actually happened. But yeah, I like fantasies, like Redwall, a lot more.
November 7, 2017
This was a fairly interesting book about synesthesia - I had read the author's more recent work on the neurological difference called Wednesday is Indigo Blue and was fascinated, so this book soon made its way onto my "to-read" list, as I wanted to know more about Michael Watson and his ability to "taste shapes". I found the author's case studies to be interesting, and was intrigued by his methodical research and attempts to "get to the bottom of" synesthesia. Part 2 of the book gave me a lot to think about in terms of emotion vs. logic, and the roles/importance that society assigns to both, particularly the ideas of emotional logic, emotional intelligence, not to mention a few surprising dips into philosophy and what it is that truly makes us human.
May 16, 2018
I loved the wide range of this book, from the prevailing attitudes of medicine and neuroscience to the well-described details of how to hypothesize and conduct experiments on synesthesia. However, this is not a book about synesthesia, at least not in its entirety. For that, try Cytowic's "Wednesday Is Indigo Blue." This is a much broader book about the functions of the brain, perception, and in the final sections, consciousness, metaphor, and even spirituality. It's an interesting exploration of ideas.
December 22, 2017
Tärkeä kirja, joka toi synestesian julkisuuteen vuonna 1993. Kirjassa on hyviä esimerkkejä, mutta myös pitkiä omaelämäkerrallisia osuuksia, keinotekoisen oloisia keskusteluja ja vanhentuneen neurotieteellisen teorian puimista. Kirjassa on muös laaja osio, jossa on muihin asioihin liittyviä lyhyitä esseitä.
March 17, 2022
An interesting study in the science of neurology by a physician thinking outside the box. A keen observer of the unexpected, Dr. Cytowic illustrates ways that people perceive the world around them and how they describe it. The last Chapter 11, as essay on Science and Spirituality, is worth reading to understand how the two can work together in one brain.
August 18, 2019
A very engaging book about not only synesthesia, but about the structure and function of the bran, the scientific process, medical research, and the roles of emotion and reason. Informative and accessible, and I'd compare it (positively) to Oliver Sack's books.
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