- Paperback: 408 pages
- Publisher: Picador; 13 edition (24 Feb 2010)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0330320912
- ISBN-13: 978-0330320917
- Product Dimensions: 19.4 x 13 x 3.6 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 31,229 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Awakenings
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Amazon.co.uk Review
It hardly seems fair that so many great doctors are also great writers. Perhaps it's qualities like sensitivity, craft and dedication that keep physicians like Oliver Sacks in hospitals all day and at writing desks all night; if nothing else, these qualities shine in books like Awakenings. This powerful set of case histories rises above its pathological foundation to find new literary territory, a medical-spiritual synthesis equally stimulating for the mind and the soul. It's no wonder Hollywood chose to turn it into a feature film--anyone can see the universal human struggle against bondage and despair in these pages.
The sleeping-sickness epidemic of 1918 caused hundreds of survivors to slip into a bizarre rigid paralysis with similarities to advanced Parkinson's disease. These patients, only occasionally able to communicate or move, were nearly all institutionalised for life, their ranks increasing every now and then with similarly afflicted men and women. Sacks came to work at a long-term care facility shortly before the first exciting results with L-DOPA and Parkinson's in the late 1960s and his patients soon embarked on dramatic, difficult recoveries from up to 50 years of torpor. He documents their spiritual and medical obstacles with great care to portray their individual personalities, long suppressed but finally released. Though many great doctors are also great writers, few can compare with Oliver Sacks for expressing the relation of medicine to the human spirit. --Rob Lightner
Review
"One of the most beautifully composed and moving works of our time." --"The Washington Post
""Compulsively readable. . . . Dr. Sacks writes beautifully and with exceptional subtlety and penetration into both the state of mind of his patients and the nature of illness generally. . . . A brilliant and humane book." --A. Alvarez, "The Observer"
"[Sacks] opens to the reader doors of perception generally passed through only by those at the far borders of human experience." --"The Boston Globe
""A masterpiece." --W. H. Auden --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
""Compulsively readable. . . . Dr. Sacks writes beautifully and with exceptional subtlety and penetration into both the state of mind of his patients and the nature of illness generally. . . . A brilliant and humane book." --A. Alvarez, "The Observer"
"[Sacks] opens to the reader doors of perception generally passed through only by those at the far borders of human experience." --"The Boston Globe
""A masterpiece." --W. H. Auden --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
35 of 36 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
You'll probably have seen the Robert de Niro film. This is the original book by neurologist Oliver Sacks, describing the L-dopamine drug trials that awakened patients 'frozen' for decades by Parkinsonian symptoms. A harrowing but sympathetic account, the book has room for the complexities missed by the film. After dramatic initial awakenings, the unpredictability of drug reactions gave varied patient histories that ranged from disastrous relapse to modest long-term success. Far less 'feelgood', but ultimately more hopeful, than the film.
20 of 21 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
If you are looking for 'the book of the film' you may be disappointed. If you have enjoyed reading other Oliver Sacks books you may also be disappointed. However, it is definitely worth the effort as it is more illuminating than the film, if less dramatic---but no less tragic for that. The book is more technical than one might expect; plenty of case histories and medical information. But Sacks is a humanist with compassion for his patients, and this still shines through the more 'dry' format of the text. I'm glad I stuck with the book as it explains much that simply isn't possible in a film---which has different objectives in any case.
I enjoyed this book, though not as much as some of his other work, and acknowledge that it may not be for everyone.
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is one of the best books I have ever read. It relates the "awakenings" experienced by post-"sleepy sickness" patients who survived the 1920's epidemic to live with deeply Parkinsonian symptoms. Real Rip-Van-Winkles woke up to changed selves and changed worlds.
This account of the disease's progress, the patients' experience, and the effects of L-dopa is overwhelming in its truth, sincerity, and above all, its humanity.
I particularly enjoyed the section at the end of the book in this edition, where one gains an insight into other ways to understand the disease, including the use of non-linear equations, and the application of Chaos theory to understand the side effects of L-dopa.
This account of the disease's progress, the patients' experience, and the effects of L-dopa is overwhelming in its truth, sincerity, and above all, its humanity.
I particularly enjoyed the section at the end of the book in this edition, where one gains an insight into other ways to understand the disease, including the use of non-linear equations, and the application of Chaos theory to understand the side effects of L-dopa.
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