The Oracle of Night
The history and science of dreams
A ground-breaking history of the human mind told through our experience of dreams — from the earliest accounts to current scientific findings — and the essential role of dreams in the formation of who we are and the world we have made.
What is a dream? Why do we dream? How do our bodies and minds use dreams?
These questions are the starting point for this unprecedented, astonishing study of the role and significance of dreams, from the beginning of human history. An investigation on the grand scale, encompassing literature, anthropology, religion, and science, it articulates the essential place dreams occupy in human culture, and how they functioned as the catalyst that compelled us to transform our earthly habitat into a human world.
From the earliest cave paintings — where the author finds a key to humankind's first dreams, which contributed to our capacity to perceive past and future — to cutting-edge scientific research, Ribeiro arrives at startling and revolutionary conclusions about the role of dreams in human existence and evolution.
He explores the advances that contemporary neuroscience, biochemistry and psychology have made into the connections between sleep, dreams, and learning, before revealing what dreams have taught us about the neural basis of memory and the transformation of memory in recall. And he makes clear that the earliest insight into dreams as oracular has been confirmed by contemporary research.
Accessible, authoritative, and fascinating from first to last, The Oracle of Nightgives us a wholly new way to understand this most basic of human experiences.
ISBN: 9780552177597 | Published: 24 January 2023(first published 2022) | Paperback | 480 pages
-
Free Shipping for orders $150+
Publishing has a diversity problem. There are less 'diverse' books being published which limits the discoverability and reach of those authors.
Representation is important. Read more about why we exist here.
An anti-racist social enterprise bookstore specialising in BIPOC books.
Only about 11% of books published are by BIPOC authors — so unless you specifically seek out books by BIPOC authors, you aren't likely to find very many of them organically. At Amplify, BIPOC authors are highlighted and celebrated. Here, they don't have to fight to be seen, and you don't have to fight to find them.
We hope that in our shop, you can discover a new favourite read, find stories that speak uniquely to you, learn about a culture outside your own (or more about your own histories), and gain a better understanding of the systems that connect us all.
Looking for something super specific?
Have a scroll through our tag directory to help direct your search and bring you to curated collections, as grouped by subgenres, identity markers, and more!
