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Cover of Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer

Moonwalking with Einstein

  • 307 pages · about 5 hours
  • First published 2011
  • 11 editions

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1 About this book

Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything is a 2011 nonfiction book by Joshua Foer. The author sets out to learn how the best memorizers work and finds himself at the 2005 U.S. Memory Championship. He then trains for a year with a coach, Ed Cooke, and returns to compete. Along the way he describes the science of memory, the history of memory techniques from the Roman rhetoricians on, and the case that deliberate practice, not special talent, makes the difference.

  • Neurosciences
  • Psychology
  • Memoir
  • Memory
  • Mnemonics
  • Self-help
  • Personal development

2 What to expect

A work of participatory journalism in which Joshua Foer spends a year training his memory and enters the U.S. Memory Championship. Along the way he explains how memory works, the history of memory techniques such as the method of loci, and the world of competitive "mental athletes". It reads as a lively personal quest mixed with science and history, and it argues that deliberate practice, more than talent, builds skill.

Good for readers who want: memory science, a personal quest, and popular psychology.

3 About Joshua Foer

Born 1982

Joshua Foer (born September 23, 1982) is a freelance journalist and author living in Brookline, Massachusetts, with a primary focus on science. He was the 2006 USA Memory Champion, which was described in his 2011 book, Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything. He also co-founded the travel company Atlas Obscura with Dylan Thuras.

Bio adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)

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