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3.87 AVERAGE
3.87 AVERAGE
First book of 2022! Wow. So I didn't think I could fall even more in love with neurology and neuropsychology but here I am today happily trying to accumulate a collection of Sacks' entire written works. Where to start? Sacks playfully illustrate a variety of different conditions, states of mind, and experiences in a highly accessible and engaging way. While some of the content could be considered a little outdated by today's standards (nods towards the autism section specifically..) I still found it to be nevertheless a fun read.
The most memorable story for me was The Disembodied Lady (Part 1: Losses) because of the almost visceral description of lacking proprioception and the disconnect of body and mind was so fascinating to me. I also liked many of the entries in Part 3: Transports, because they signified a less-explored link between the spiritual and medical that most popular knowledge is yet to understand.
Would recommend, but I am going to read some of his other novels for a comparative point. Very cool stuff, though.
The most memorable story for me was The Disembodied Lady (Part 1: Losses) because of the almost visceral description of lacking proprioception and the disconnect of body and mind was so fascinating to me. I also liked many of the entries in Part 3: Transports, because they signified a less-explored link between the spiritual and medical that most popular knowledge is yet to understand.
Would recommend, but I am going to read some of his other novels for a comparative point. Very cool stuff, though.
informative
reflective
medium-paced
emotional
informative
reflective
slow-paced
In this collection of case studies, Sacks describes some of the unique patients whom he worked with whose neurological impairments were startling and even shocking at times. He describes individuals who can no longer recognize faces but can otherwise appear completely normal, people whose memories are completely absent, patients dealing with phantom sensations or total unawareness of objects to the left side, individuals who are labeled severely cognitively impaired yet stand out with exceptional artistic talents, among others. All off these people have impairments that greatly affect their wellbeing and quality of life. Sacks adds a humanistic perspective to these tales as he highlights the whole person and the functional implications of the impairments rather than the physiological process.
I would have liked this more, I think, if I had read this when I first added it to my “to-read” list- back when I was a premed student and had just heard Oliver Sacks on Radiolab. I say this because some of the sections are now extremely dated (looking at you Part 4), and we’ve come a long way in how we think and manage some of these diseases, certainly in our accommodations for disability and management of consent. That said, Oliver Sacks was obviously brilliant, and this book reads as a unique cross between a case report, a neuroscience lecture series, and a philosophical novella. However, at times it leads into the “too-poetic” and verbose prose, with casual use of words like “verisimilitude” and patients’ conversations seemingly a bit on the nose with their self-assessments. (If this is an accurate report of patients’ speech in his visits then I apologize but it did seem very stilted at times). The parts where this book really excelled were the few glimpses Dr. Sacks infused his own humanity into the stories, as well as the post scripts- how the patients have done since the initial publishing, as well as incorporation of feedback from colleagues, letters, and Dr. Sacks’s own improved understanding of some of these cases. Each section had at least a couple stories that really grabbed my interest, but there were a few in each section as well that seemed overly wordy and too repetitive for my taste.
It is so fascinating reading about the far out cases of neurology, especially when working in the health sector. Some stories are a bit dry and too philosophical, but most are to the point and very interesting. Only thing that really irritated me was that the disabled are being referred to as 'simpletons, idiots, defectives', but maybe those were the terms when this book was published back in 1985.
This was a quality read about various unique and fasciny cases of neurology gone wrong. A few parts showed their age but otherwise the author was descriptive and even poetic when discussing the cases. I'd recommend to anyone interested in learning more about how the brain affects human behavior and the many, many ways it can go wrong.
This gripping novel is helpful in understanding the underpinnings of many psycho-social disorders.
3.5/5
Fascinating stories told from a fairly clinical perspective (despite a warmth and clear care from the author). Filled with quite a bit of medical jargon and dated language used to describe neurological conditions. The stories are compelling, however, I was struck by the ethics of consent (a topic much evolved from the time when this book was published.
I've also read Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks and enjoyed it much more.
Fascinating stories told from a fairly clinical perspective (despite a warmth and clear care from the author). Filled with quite a bit of medical jargon and dated language used to describe neurological conditions. The stories are compelling, however, I was struck by the ethics of consent (a topic much evolved from the time when this book was published.
I've also read Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks and enjoyed it much more.
informative
reflective