Sleeping Beauties
Why Good Ideas Go Dormant and How They Wake Up
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Sleeping Beauties
Pre-order Now for £34.99
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Narrated by:
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By:
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David Byrne
About this listen
We love to believe in a meritocracy of ideas - that genius is always recognised, innovation always seized upon and rewarded. Yet so many of the people we now recognise as the world's great creators initially got little traction for their work. It faded out, and it was only later, often much later, that it somehow came roaring back to life and made a lasting impact.
Discoveries as diverse as dark matter to continental drift, technologies from solar panels to the steam engine; artists from Bach to Brueghel, Vermeer to Melville all were 'sleeping beauties'. Why did they fall asleep? How did they wake up? Ranging across many centuries and the full scope of human endeavour, Byrne arrives at some important conclusions which in sum give us a lens for bringing to light new seeds for our own future breakthroughs.
Humbling yet hopeful, these stories add up to a compass that leads us to the courage to try new things and the wisdom to embrace them. In a time that can seem all too dark, it's a powerful source of freely available light, delightful in itself and fit for all our human endeavours.
©2026 David Byrne (P)2026 Canongate Books Ltd