Before We Forget - by Mary Soderstrom (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Safeguarding collective wisdom is a powerful tool for civilization to overcome the major upheavals ahead.

Climate change, civil unrest, wars: How will we make it through the tough times looming before us? By remembering, Mary Soderstrom argues. Ours is not the first time in history when catastrophe has threatened societies, and using examples from China, the Roman Empire, and North American Indigenous cultures, Soderstrom shows how memory can lead the way toward the future. She begins by examining how memory works and then details how we store our collective memories in libraries and archives, as well as in the vastness of the digital universe.

In part an entertaining history of knowledge and where we keep it, Before We Forget allays fears and encourages people to develop strategies for safeguarding collective and individual wisdom, which we will need to meet the challenges ahead.

Review Quotes

Original, wide-ranging, and insightful, this remarkable interweaving of science, history, and personal anecdote finds a writer-magician doing the near-impossible. While exploring both individual and collective memory, and incorporating the lessons of contemporary science, as well as those of China, Rome, and Indigenous North America, Mary Soderstrom reaches into a hat and pulls out a coherent, readable work of art.

About the Author

Mary Soderstrom is a writer with eight works of non-fiction, three short story collections, six novels, and one children's book to her credit. Before We Forget is her nineteenth book. She lives in Montreal.