Touching the Rock: An Experience of Blindness - Softcover

Hull, John M.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0281077479 ISBN 13: 9780281077472

Publisher: SPCK Publishing, 2016

Synopsis

Touching the Rock is a unique exploration of that distant, infinitely strange ‘other world’ of blindness. John Hull writes of odd sounds and echoes, of people without faces, of a curious new relationship between waking and dreaming, of a changed perception of nature and human personality. He reveals a world in which every human experience – eating and lovemaking, playing with children and buying drinks in the bar – is transformed.

About this title

Review

In 1983, Hull, a university lecturer who had lived with sight problems from the age of 13, found that the dark discs he had fought for 36 years had finally overwhelmed his sight. The spiritual and emotional reactions to his vision loss form the basis of this poignant memoir, and the many questions he asks contribute to his eventual acceptance of his fate. A richly textured dream life adds to his exploration of the other world of blindness, and the understanding and meaning he finds coalesce into a powerful work. --Library Journal

This unsentimental memoir of the experiences of a newly blind person provides many insights about the quest for the unified life. --Publishers Weekly

The incisiveness of Hull's observation, the beauty of his language, make this book poetry; the depth of his reflection turns it into phenomenology or philosophy. --Oliver Sacks, neurologist and bestselling author (1933-2015)

From the Author

JOHN HULL (1935-2015) was Emeritus Professor of Religious Education at the University of Birmingham and Honorary Professor of Practical Theology in The Queen's Foundation for Ecumenical Theological Education, Birmingham. In 2012 the Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB) granted him a Lifetime Achievement Award for his contributions to the literature of blindness. His writings in education, theology and disability have been translated into a dozen languages.

About this edition

• Publisher: SPCK Publishing
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 0281077479
• ISBN 13: 9780281077472
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 216