The Quiet Ear
An Investigation of Missing Sound: A Memoir
A groundbreaking exploration of deafness by a young award-winning poet—a memoir, a cultural history, and a call to action
“Expansive, generous, and massively tender.”—Hanif Abdurraqib, author of There’s Always This Year
“Beautifully complicates and expands our understanding of what deafness is . . . a book that changed how I will move through the world.”—Clint Smith, author of How the Word Is Passed
One of Vulture’s Most Anticipated Books of the Summer
I live with the aid of deafness. Like poetry, it has given me an art, a history, a culture and a tradition to live through. This book charts that art in the hopes of offering a map, a mirror, a small part of a larger story.
Raymond Antrobus was first diagnosed as deaf…
Available for Pre-Order
$39.00
August 19, 2025Raymond Antrobus is the author of three collections of poetry, most recently Signs/Music, of which the title poem was published in The New Yorker. His work has won numerous prizes in the UK, where his poems are frequently taught in schools. He is also the author of two children’s books, including Can Bears Ski?, which became the first story broadcast on the BBC entirely in British Sign Language. Antrobus was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and appointed an MBE. He lives in London.