How to Disappear

Notes on Invisibility in a Time of Transparency

By: Akiko Busch

Narrated by: Gabra Zackman

It is time to reevaluate the merits of the inconspicuous life, to search out some antidote to continuous exposure, and to reconsider the value of going unseen, undetected, or overlooked in this new world. Might invisibility be regarded not simply as refuge but as a condition with its own meaning and power? The impulse to escape notice is not about complacent isolation or senseless conformity but about maintaining identity, autonomy, and voice.

In our networked and image-saturated lives, the notion of disappearing has never been both more alluring. Today, we are relentlessly encouraged, even conditioned, to reveal, share, and promote ourselves. The pressure to be public comes not just from our peers but from vast and pervasive technology companies that want to profit from patterns in our behavior. A lifelong student and observer of the natural world, Busch sets out to explore her own uneasiness with this arrangement, and what she senses is a widespread desire for a less scrutinized way of life - for invisibility. Writing in rich painterly detail about her own life, her family, and some of the world's most exotic and remote places, she savors the pleasures of being unseen. Discovering and dramatizing a wonderful range of ways of disappearing, from virtual reality goggles that trick the wearer into believing her body has disappeared to the way Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway finds a sense of affiliation with the world around her as she ages, Busch deliberates on subjects new and old with equal sensitivity and incisiveness.

How to Disappear is a unique and exhilarating accomplishment, overturning the dangerous modern assumption that somehow fame and visibility equate to success and happiness. Busch presents a field guide to invisibility, reacquainting us with the merits of remaining inconspicuousness, and finding genuine alternatives to a life of perpetual exposure. Accessing timeless truths in order to speak to our most urgent contemporary problems, she inspires us to develop a deeper appreciation for personal privacy in a vast and intrusive world.

©2019 Akiko Busch (P)2019 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

“Coming upon [How to Disappear] was like finding the Advil bottle in the medicine cabinet after stumbling about with a headache for a long time.... For [Busch], invisibility is not simply a negative, the inverse of visibility. Going unseen, undetected, overlooked: These are experiences with their own inherent ‘meaning and power’; what we need is a ‘field guide’ for recognizing them. And this is what Busch offers, roaming from essay to essay in a loose, associative style, following invisibility where it takes her.... Inconspicuousness can be powerful - this may be Busch’s most radical point, especially at a moment when we’re conditioned to think power means yelling louder than everyone else in your Twitter feed, or showing the world in Instagram how you’re living your best life.... Silence and invisibility, [Busch insists], are part of our everyday lives - the place our mind wanders when we’re in the shower or out jogging, the feeling we get looking out the window of an airplane, the pleasure of becoming a stranger on a bustling city street. We take these pauses, these moments of exhalation, for granted, but we should clutch them close. They are our armor against the onslaught.” (Gal Beckerman, The New York Times Book Review, cover review)

“Akiko Busch’s How to Disappear: Notes on Invisibility in a Time of Transparency serves as a gentle reminder...[to] stop confusing what is most obvious or distracting for what is genuinely important. Almost everything that actually matters in life happens beneath the surface. Ms. Busch, who has rightly been compared to Annie Dillard and Edward Abbey, has dedicated nearly 30 years to sounding this message, one that our age seems intent on ignoring.... It is precisely Ms. Busch’s subtle contrarianism that deserves our sustained attention.... How to Disappear is, at least in part, a description of how the world might reappear to us if we weren’t so hellbent on overwhelming it.... On the surface, How to Disappear is a palliative for the alienation that modern overexposure begets. Ms. Busch would like to save us from ourselves, from the lonely fate that afflicts Narcissus, his eyes forever locked on the only person he has ever truly loved - himself. But in its deeper moments, the book touches on an abiding, but easily forgotten, truth: Disappearing, the act of losing our selves, is a precondition of selflessness. Ms. Busch’s deeper concern is to save not Narcissus but rather the wider world his selfishness affects.” (John Kaag, Wall Street Journal)

“In this provocative series of essays, Busch examines how social media and the surveillance economy have redefined the way we live.... Throughout, she asks important questions about the consequences of hypervisibility.” (BBC Culture, Ten Books to Read this February)

Lots to think about here

I especially found interesting the chapter that examined the invisibility of middle-aged women, and referenced Virginia, Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway

Thought-provoking, engaging, beautifully narrated

This book is so thoughtfully written and well-researched. Gabra Zackman's nuanced, heartfelt, and respectful narration is spot-on.

Not what I expected

I thought this was going to be a more practical book. It was very philosophical and spiritual. The story itself was very hard for me to follow.

Not a Guide on How to Disappear

I was expecting more of a practical guide but this ended up being a philosophical research paper on the idea of invisibility. I returned this title after the third chapter.

A Slog

The book is not about *how* to disappear but is more about the author's views and philosophical musings on invisibility in all its various forms (physical, cultural, societal, etc.). There is some interesting stuff, some needless interjection of (leftist) politics and a lot of repetition. The title is misleading and the actual material is often pretentious. Save one or two chapters, it makes a wonderful sleep aid.

Took nothing practical away

More of an academic examination of the concept. Not what I expected at all. Buyer beware!