Selected Letters

The letters of one of the greatest observers of the human species, revealing his passion for life and work, friendship and art, medicine and society, and the richness of his relationships with friends, family, and fellow intellectuals over the decades, collected here for the first time.

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Dr. Oliver Sacks – the self-described “philosophical physician” – wrote letters throughout his life: to his parents and his beloved Auntie Len, to friends and colleagues from London, Oxford, California, and around the world. The letters begin with Sacks’ arrival in North America as a young man eager to establish himself away from the confines of postwar England, and carry us through his bumpy early career in medicine and the discovery of his writer’s voice, outlining the doctor’s developing interest in matters of sight and the musical brain which would shape the focus of his book Awakenings.

Sacks’ letters chart his growth as not just a medical professional, but a man too: detailed here are the wilds of his weight-lifting, motorcycle-riding years; his many friendships and exchanges with writers, artists, and scientists (to say nothing of astronauts, botanists, and mathematicians), and his deep gratitude for all these relationships at the end of his life.

Sensitively introduced and edited by Kate Edgar, Sacks’ longtime editor, the letters deliver a portrait of Sacks as he wrestles with the workings of the brain and mind. We see, through his eyes, the beginnings of modern neuroscience, following the thought processes of one of the great intellectuals of our time, whose words were unfailingly shaped with generosity and wonder toward other people.