From Homer to Headphones

Are audiobooks a revival of ancient storytelling?

Audiobooks are our greatest evidence that literature is subject to the human desire to constantly evolve all that we have created. As technological advancements increase, many of the arts as we know them are becoming less recognisable. The transformation of literature from the written to the spoken word begs the question of whether audiobooks are a legitimate substitute for the traditional form of reading. The common perception is they are simply a lazier alternative to opening a book and dedicating yourself to its contents. However, to the generations that came thousands of years before us, the oral transmission of stories, histories, and myth was the expected form. It seems that rather than inventing a new means of reception, we have found ourselves re-entering the cycle of ancient oral storytelling, where stories were heard rather than read.

The scarcity of written texts in the ancient world gave bards the responsibility of preserving stories for the community. The tales that make up the famous epics of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey would have been shared with large audiences at festivals and public gatherings, ensuring that these stories were passed down through generations. Storytelling was a critical foundation of the culture and moral teachings of these ancient communities. Later, these texts were transcribed and preserved in the forms we are familiar with, but for hundreds of years prior, they were spoken, altered, and performed in ways so engaging that their survival transcended material physicality.

Audiobooks today are reminiscent of oral tradition, yet public opinion has since become divided on the form. For some, the practicality of audiobooks makes reading a more accessible task in a world that seems to get busier and busier by the day. It is undeniably easier to listen to your headphones on the walk to class than it is to sit down and dedicate time to reading. The auditory experience takes the responsibility of deciphering tone and emotion from the reader and instead gives it to the audiobook narrator: the contemporary bard. The solitary act of reading becomes a shared experience, easing the burden that some may perceive it to be.

For others, these positive attributes cannot replace the ritual of smelling a fresh paperback or considering the previous ownership of a second-hand copy and scribbling furiously down a blank margin. While audiobooks share the auditory sensation of ancient storytelling, they lack the visual accompaniment of gesture and music. Radio book adaptations may satiate the musical element but once more lack the theatrical mysticism of the ancient form. When reading words on a physical page, constructing the tones independently, the imagination is forced to act in such a way that a voice in your headphones cannot replicate. The written word permits world-building and escapism more effectively than the conversational dualism of audio can provide. The solitary effort necessary to achieve total escapism is what leaves many modern readers loyal to the written word.

In voicing a narrative, the bard brought new life to a story in every recital. In attempting the same task, audiobooks re-introduce a sense of continued evolution, but this relies on the reader’s active imagination alongside the dialogue. The act of sharing something is what makes auditory literature so appealing, creating a fulfilled experience only when the words have been both spoken and heard between two people. The dialogue is no longer confined between the author and reader, but is now extended to a more complex layer of interpretations between the author, narrator, and listener. The continued rise of audiobook engagement suggests the power of the spoken word is as compelling today as it was to those living thousands of years ago, connecting people through literature once more.

Image from Wikimedia Commons