Selfie Audiobook By Will Storr cover art

Selfie

How We Became So Self-Obsessed and What It's Doing To Us

 Preview

$0.00 for first 30 days

Try for $0.00
Access a growing selection of included Audible Originals, audiobooks, and podcasts.
You will get an email reminder before your trial ends.
Audible Plus auto-renews for $7.95/mo after 30 days. Upgrade or cancel anytime.

Selfie

By: Will Storr
Narrated by: Shaun Grindell
Try for $0.00

$7.95 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy for $21.49

Buy for $21.49

Confirm purchase
Pay using card ending in
Switch payment method
By confirming your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use, License, and Amazon's Privacy Notice. Taxes where applicable.
Cancel

We are living in an age of heightened individualism. Success is a personal responsibility. Our culture tells us that to succeed is to be slim, rich, happy, extroverted, popular, and flawless. We have become self-obsessed. And our expectation of perfection comes at a cost. Millions are suffering under the torture of this impossible fantasy. The pressure to conform to this ideal has changed who we are.

It was not always like this. To explain how we got here, award-winning journalist Will Storr leads us on a "terrific tour through the history of self-obsession" (NPR, On Point) that explores the origins of this notion of the perfect self that torments so many of us: Where does this ideal come from? Why is it so powerful? Is there any way to break its spell?

Full of thrilling and unexpected connections among history, psychology, economics, neuroscience, and more, Selfie is an unforgettable book that makes sense of who we have become. Ranging from Ancient Greece, through the Christian Middle Ages, to the self-esteem evangelists of 1980s California, the rise of the "selfie" generation, and the era of hyper-individualism in which we live now, Selfie tells the epic tale of the person we all know so intimately - because it's us.

©2018 Will Storr (P)2018 Tantor Aging & Longevity Anthropology Economics Personal Development Psychology Psychology & Mental Health Social Psychology & Interactions Sociology Ancient Economics

Critic reviews

" . . . [P]lacing this symbol of millennial narcissism in a larger cultural story... Selfie traces selfie culture to the self-esteem movement." (The New Yorker)
All stars
Most relevant  
Will Storr is a journalist, and as such, his book takes an anecdotal angle to the rise of the western sense of self. It is fascinating, engaging, and enlightening. He does not aim to preach or accuse. He does not vilify millennials or claim that we are all entitled and self-obsessed. He *does* make astute and non-threatening observations throughout, with self-awareness and humour!

If you like Jon Ronson, you’ll like this book

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The depth of research and rich analysis done by Storr culminates in a historical, psychological, anthropological, and neurological conclusion that finally makes sense of these seemingly senseless, unsure and insecure times.

Finally! It all makes sense!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I am very enamored with the topic and am going to try and make it through but this might be the worst narration I have ever heard. I'm trying to listen to it on 1.5 speed to help, but it is sooooo robotic. I'm very surprised more reviewers have not mentioned it. It really is terrible.

ARRGH! The Narration!!!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Storr gave me a lot to think about. Highlights for me were the concept of confabulation and our brains as unreliable narrators, the examination of neoliberal ideals setting the bar on the worth of an individual, one of the better explanations for the impact of social media on our sense of belonging and safety, and thoughts on what it means to be a neurotic person.

I didn’t know I needed this book

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I fear that this book does not get the attention it deserves. It is a fresh, honest analysis of how we have arrived at a point in culture where narcissism reigns. I wish there were more on how to correct course culturally.

Important book that deserves attention

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I enjoyed that the author tried to maintain an outsider understanding of the true self before reflecting on himself. Investigation into previous studies reflected on the data vs self reflection. A very well presented informative reflection of personalities, nature vs nurture, and of the self ideal of today vs previous years.

A review of the true self

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I appreciated Will Storr’s book on Status so that why I got this… but the stories in this were too meandering for my taste and the over all theme too loose.

Good not great

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
terrible listening experience. this sounds ridiculous. my GPS could do a better job. the book, however, is great.

sounds like a robot.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Why did he have to do that. And blaming everything on neo liberalism is very simplistic

He had to mention Gaza

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I have two master's degrees, and I struggled to understand this book and material. I don't think I'm particularly obtuse, but the subject was murky. I heard about the book on NPR, and was so excited. this was such a letdown.

Very heavy

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.