Review of “The Story of Stories: The Million-Year History of a Uniquely Human Art” by Kevin Ashton

The Stuff:

Fair warning: rant to follow:

In his preface, author Kevin Ashton tells the reader:

“In this book, I want to describe how stories and new tools for telling them change us. The story of stories—which, ironically, is largely untold—offers a map for navigating our strange new world and hope in a difficult, turbulent time.” p. xiv

…okaaay, I thought as I read this. Nice idea, but “largely untold”? Huh? Maybe this guy snoozed through freshman Western Civ? He never heard of the printing press and the role it played in the Protestant Reformation? Or Marshall McLuhan’s oh-so-cool dictum, “The medium is the message”? These are not esoteric concepts. I even took a college course on the history of mass communication, way back at the dawn of time.

The author did not fall off the turnip truck just the other day. Kevin Ashton (b. 1968) is a former researcher at MIT. Among his accomplishments, according to the source of all knowledge, Wikipedia, is developing a global standard for RFID (radio frequency identification). He also coined the term “Internet of Things.”

I thought I’d give him the benefit of the doubt. His thesis might be more complex than I gave him credit for at this early stage, but really, the topic has been studied. Maybe I’d be arguing with him through the whole book.

He addresses this, interestingly enough, and warns the reader that he can’t hear their arguments, regardless of correctness or eloquence. They would merely be arguing into the void. I had to read the statement again to make sure it didn’t start with “Grasshopper…”

It would not be the last time I’d hear that didactic tone in his writing. If not surprising, it was irritating. And he’d better make damn sure I couldn’t poke holes in whatever he said.  Grasshopper, my gluteus maximus.

Near the end of the book (to create dramatic tension?), he lists his eight technology revolutions: singing, drawing, writing, printing, electricity, electrons, bits, and smartphones.

Ashton posits that stories give meaning to things and make information easy to remember. Early humans used songs and poetry.

Several things caught my “Uh-huh” reflex, but the first major one was this:

“Our exceptional pitch perception almost certainly evolved for reasons related to sexual reproduction: male human voices have an average of 112 waves per second, and female voices have an average of 169 waves per second. The pitch of our voices and our pitch preferences vary with fertility, and both male and female pitch influence mate choice and reproductive success. Because of this, early humans with better pitch perception had more reproductive success than early humans with worse pitch perception, which led to us becoming a species that is extraordinarily good at perceiving pitch.” p. 27

(Note: “pitch” denotes not only a person’s “base” frequency of voice, but also all accompanying harmonics.)

This offers the reader a classic piece of circular reasoning: Our species developed an exceptional pitch perception because those with good pitch perception have more babies.

So, off to the footnotes. As far as I could make out, Ashton is summarizing a study “Voice pitch predicts reproductive success in male hunter-gatherers.”(1)

Granted, I read only the abstract and skimmed a few paragraphs below it. It discusses a study of one modern hunter-gatherer people that found a “selection pressure for low-pitch voices in men.” It did not speak to selection pressure for pitch among women. It also noted that voice pitch did not predict child mortality. It also did not (as Ashton did) generalize this study to human ancestors or early humans.

So, it appears that Ashton is telling his readers a story. Grasshopper has to check Master’s footnotes, damnit.

It’s not all stercus tauri, of course, even the most woo-woo-sounding stuff. In the final chapter, the author writes of the dangers and hopes of AI and related technologies. He speaks of trees talking to each other and how we humans could learn from them (*sigh*). I had to check that out. While listening to an old Enya album (The Memory of Trees), I came across a story (2) about a symbiotic relationship with mycorrhizal fungi. Not only do the trees and fungi swap nutrients, but they can send chemical “messages” to one another across the fungal network, warning of things like insect attacks. It is fascinating, delightful, and wonderful all by itself. If for nothing else, I’m glad I read this book for the chance to read the details of this.

And for the excuse to listen to Enya again after all these years.

After telling the reader that those who disagree with him are arguing into the void, Ashton closes with a plea for readers who enjoyed his work to tap friends on the shoulder about his book. I won’t do that to my friends.

While there are interesting points, most of what the author discusses has been covered before. And he likes to tell a story with dramatic flair. I also found his teacher-to-student lecturing a bit much to swallow. I spent too much time arguing into the void to recommend the book, I’m afraid, but of course, others may find it interesting.




(1) Apicella CL, Feinberg DR, Marlowe FW. Voice pitch predicts reproductive success in male hunter-gatherers. Biol Lett. 2007 Dec 22;3(6):682-4. doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2007.0410. PMID: 17895219; PMCID: PMC2391230.

(2) ‘Mother Tree’ Ecologist Suzanne Simard Shares Secrets Of Tree Communication : Shots – Health News : NPR

Title: The Story of Stories: The Million-Year History of a Uniquely Human Art
Author: Kevin Ashton
First published: 2026
Length: nonfiction book