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From the bestselling author of The Art of Stillness, a revelatory exploration of the abiding clarity and calm to be found in quiet retreat

Over the past three decades, Pico Iyer has made more than a hundred journeys to a small hermitage high above the sea in Big Sur, California. He's not a Christian, nor a member of any religious group, and yet his life has been transformed by these periods of time spent in silence.

In Learning from Silence, Iyer travels deep into inner stillness and joy in his many seasons at the monastery, even as his life is going through constant change: houses burn, a parent dies, a daughter is diagnosed with cancer. He shares the revelations he experiences, alongside wisdom from other non-monastics who have learned from adversity and inwardness. Most profoundly, he shows how solitude can be a training in community and companionship.

In so doing, he offers a unique outsider's view of monastic life - and of a group of selfless souls who have dedicated their days to ensuring there's a space for quiet and recollection that's open to us all.

Radiant, intimate and gripping, Learning from Silence offers ageless counsel about the power of silence and what it can teach us about how to live, how to love and, ultimately, how to die.

'Beautiful . . . Iyer masterfully and lyrically shows us how we may need to find a new home - one far more solemn, communal and silent than our present one - in order to return properly to ourselves' Alain de Botton

'I trust that reading this book may help many to lead lives of greater compassion and deeper peace of mind' His Holiness the Dalai Lama

'One of the most soulful and perceptive writers of our time' Maria Popova

'An exquisite call to silence and the myriad connections it kindles' Katherine May

© Pico Iyer 2025 (P) Penguin Audio 2025