For the Benefit of Those Who See

Dispatches from the World of the Blind
By Rosemary Mahoney (Hardcover Book, 2014)
The celebrated author of Down the Nile travels far afield as part of her investigation into the world of the blind.

In the tradition of Oliver Sacks's The Island of the Colorblind, Rosemary Mahoney tells the story of Braille Without Borders, the first school for the blind in Tibet, and of Sabriye Tenberken, the remarkable blind woman who founded the school. Fascinated and impressed by what she learned from the blind children of Tibet, Mahoney was moved to investigate further the cultural history of blindness. As part of her research, she spent three months teaching at Tenberken's international training center for blind adults in Kerala, India, an experience that reveals both the shocking oppression endured by the world's blind, as well as their great resilience, integrity, ingenuity, and strength. By living among the blind, Rosemary Mahoney enables us to see them in fascinating close up, revealing their particular "quality of ease that seems to broadcast a fundamental connection to the world." Having read FOR THE BENEFIT OF THOSE WHO SEE, you will never see the world in quite the same way again.
  • Little, Brown and Company
    • Format: Hardcover Book

    • Price: $27.00 US/$30.00 CAN

    • ISBN-13: 9780316043427

    • On Sale Date: 01/14/2014

    • Publisher: Little, Brown and Company

    Formats Available: Hardcover Book, Electronic Book, Audiobook

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The celebrated author of Down the Nile travels far afield as part of her investigation into the world of the blind.

In the tradition of Oliver Sacks's The Island of the Colorblind, Rosemary Mahoney tells the story of Braille Without Borders, the first school for the blind in Tibet, and of Sabriye Tenberken, the remarkable blind woman who founded the school. Fascinated and impressed by what she learned from the blind children of Tibet, Mahoney was moved to investigate further the cultural history of blindness. As part of her research, she spent three months teaching at Tenberken's international training center for blind adults in Kerala, India, an experience that reveals both the shocking oppression endured by the world's blind, as well as their great resilience, integrity, ingenuity, and strength. By living among the blind, Rosemary Mahoney enables us to see them in fascinating close up, revealing their particular "quality of ease that seems to broadcast a fundamental connection to the world." Having read FOR THE BENEFIT OF THOSE WHO SEE, you will never see the world in quite the same way again.

Rosemary Mahoney is the author of The Early Arrival of Dreams, a New York Times Notable Book; Whoredom in Kimmage, a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist; Down the Nile: Alone in a Fisherman's Skiff, a New York Times Notable Book; and two other books. She was a 2011 Guggenheim Fellow and is the recipient of a Whiting Writer's Award.
  • Praise for Rosemary Mahoney's Down the Nile:

    "Mahoney has a gift for revealing apparently unremarkable moments in such a way as to make them utterly engrossing....sinuous and richly textured writing and an eye for vivid and startling details" (New York Times Book Review).

  • "A travel-minded memoir guaranteed to transport you." (Vogue).

  • "Riveting....The trip would be no more than a gutsy stunt if Mahoney were not such a beautifully precise writer and such a compassionate observer.... In the course of her trip, Mahoney traversed just 120 miles of the world's longest river; by the end of her brilliant travelogue, you'll wish she'd tackled the whole length."
    (Entertainment Weekly (An EW Pick)).

  • "It is utterly frank; sometimes rather scary; often extremely witty, brave, and revealing in its generalizations; and above all essentially kind."
    (in a Conde Nast Traveler feature, "The 86 Greatest Travel Books of All Time").

  • "Essential to the success of "Down the Nile" are Mahoney's quick-silver intelligence, her sharp eyes, and her slightly astringent voice. Yet at the same time she is patient and generous enough to allow people and things to show her their best."
    (The Christian Science Monitor).

Formats

Product Details

For the Benefit of Those Who See
  • Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
  • Price: $27.00 US/$30.00 CAN
  • Pages: 288
  • Physical Dimensions: 5-1/2" x 8-1/4"
  • ISBN-13: 9780316043427
  • On Sale Date: 01/14/2014
For the Benefit of Those Who See