Oliver Sacks's The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat
As a child, I watched Alfred Hitchcock Theater, The Twilight Zone and other science fiction or horror shows. Often times the storyline was based on a victim's mental problems or their skewed perception of the world. Looking back, I remember the fascination I felt when watching one specific episode of the Twillight Zone. In this particular episode, a man turned into a zombie by some type of poison. Essentially he was still alive, but he was dead to the world. In the end he was embalmed while he was completely conscious yet could not say anything to prevent it. Like this incident, every episode captivated me but when it was over I could sleep easy because there was no possibility of any of it happening. Oliver Sacks disrupts my childhood understanding of what is plausible and what is not in the real world. In his Book, The Man Who mistook his Wife for a Hat, Sacks compiles a group of stories that appeal to the curiosity and compassion of a young boy through his close look at human experiences in the eyes of science, medicine and new technology.
The chapters discussing 'Losses'; and 'Transports'; sparked my interest the most. The first story that caught my attention was about the sixty year old Madeline J. who was suffers from being 'congenitally blind'; and has 'cerebral palsy';(Sack 59). She was a very bright and intelligent woman that gained all her knowledge and learning from listening to books and from talking to people. She had never learned Braille because her hands were 'Useless godforsaken lumps of dough…'; Through simple tests, Sacks discovered that her hand recognized light touches, pain, and temperature. All basic sensations and perceptions were in tact. However, when objects were placed in her hands, she could not identify them. She did not try to search and explore the object; 'there were no active 'interogatory' movements of here hands. Sacks concluded that her hands were fine functionally; she did not know they were there. Madeline had to discover her hands and make the neural connection before she would be able to use them (Sacks 59-61).
In an effort to get Madeline to use her hands, he asked her nurses to put her food slightly out of reach and leave the room on occasions. Sacks hope that due to the hunger, she would reach out for the food and use her hands. One day 'impatie...
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...Bhagawhandi's tumor was found in the frontal lobe. DNT have many intracortical nodules that vary in size. Its cells resemble 'well-differentiated oligodendroglioma';. However the cells are often found in clusters and other intricate shapes. Because of the tumor the 'adjacent cerebral cortex often exhibits cortical dysphasia with disturbed lamination and disarray in architecture (Final).
Oliver Sacks does an excellent job of writing about that appeals to all walks of life and a diverse set of cultures. He translates topics that would take a doctorate degree to understand and presents it in a way that is entertaining and a joy to read. In the story of the blind sculptress he gives us hope, feeds our curiosity with the phantom finger, and finally touches our heart in our trip with the Indian girl back home.
Works Cited
Carlson, Neil R. Foundations of Physiological Psychology. Allyn and Bacon. London. 1999.
'Case Eight - Dysembryoplastic Neuroepithelial Tumor';. http://www.uhrad.com/mriarc/mri008.htm
'Introduction to Cerebral Palsy';. http://www.islandnet.com/~aclemens/intro2.htm
Sacks, Oliver. The Man who Mistook his Wife for a Hat. Touchstone Book. New York. 1985.
Good evening and welcome to tonight’s episode of Learning Literature. Tonight we will be celebrating the 20th anniversary of Gattaca by analysing the techniques text producers employ to construct representations of social issues relating to marginalised groups. We will focus on two classic pieces of literature, Ken Kessey’s, One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, as well as Andrew Niccol’s Gattaca. Through a range of techniques, the text producers have included representations of freedom and independence, power, as well as discrimination in each of their respective texts.
In Dean Koontz’s book Odd Thomas a young man’s life is laid bare before us. The book’s protagonist is a 20 year old named Odd Thomas. Odd is fry cook at a diner, in a small town in California called Pico Mundo. His life is described as pretty normal except Odd has the ability to see dead people. More importantly he not only sees dead people but he is given this ability to seemingly help dead people right the wrongs in their lives. The book is written in first person and it gives Odd’s account of a major event that happened in August, in the sleepy town of Pico Mundo. Through his recount and back story, we see not only what happens but the protagonist’s thoughts and feelings. Koontz’s book, Odd Thomas, uses in story influences to provide convincing characterization for a well-rounded main character that has had an interesting life.
Death is one of life's most challenging obstacles. Tim O'Brien was exposed to more than his fair share of death. To manage the emotional stress, he developed methods of coping with the death in his life. O'Brien's novel, The Things They Carried, demonstrates his attempts to make death less real through psychotherapeutic tactics like telling stories about the dead as if they were living and conceiving the dead as items instead of people.
This work documented the human experience in a light that I would not have seen it had I only read the books assigned to me in class. The themes in this book and how they were portrayed helped me to be able learn symbolism a bit better and also to understand my own life more clearly.
...usion, we find that from this essay we have a better understanding of why Stephen King believes all of us are mentally ill in some way, just maybe not to as high a degree as “Jack the ripper”. That we all enjoy the hunt either on the big screen or in a field, it’s part of our primal instincts. We see that humans crave things they are not supposed to and that’s ok as long as you are letting those emotions out in a healthy way. Stephen King has done a brilliant job of carrying out his thesis in this essay proving his theory that we are all mentally ill. We all need some way to release the dark feelings within us, we have all known this for many years, and movies seem to be the most current form of treatment. So treat yourself to a horror movie if you dare its great therapy.
“Death's Acre” tells about the career of a forensic hero, Dr. Bill Bass, creator of the famous "Body Farm" at the University of Tennessee-the world's only research facility devoted to studying human decomposition. He tells about his life and how he became an anthropoligist. He tells about the Lindbergh kidnapping and murder, explores the mystery of a headless corpse whose identity surprised police.
The mind is a very powerful tool when it is exploited to think about situations out of the ordinary. Describing in vivid detail the conditions of one after his, her, or its death associates the mind to a world that is filled with horrific elements of a dark nature.
Goldman's use of symbolism is ingenious and mad all at once. Reading the book is like going on a rollercoaster you're not completely sure is safe. The symbolism from the interruptions keep you completely grounded while his off the mark characters suck you in to your own imagination. Forcing us all to think is a unique take by author standards considering most authors try to make the reader forget about reality and keep us all in a sort of trance. Goldman does just the opposite and its all fueled by our own creation.
“Horror and science fiction tend to present radically opposite interpretations of what may look like comparable situations.” (Kawin, 1981.) Bruce Kawin helps the reader to understand how a story in the genre of science fiction could be adapted, or bastardized if you like, into a horror. This is similar to the film adaptation of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Both “Frankenstein” (1931) and “Bride of Frankenstein” (1935) portrayed characters and events differently than Shelley would have desired. Her novel had many deeper implications than the movie portrayed.
“Why We Crave Horror Movies,” an essay by the legendary Stephen King, explains two challenging concepts to understand: why people like gory horror movies and how people are able to control their darkest desires. “I think that we’re all mentally ill; those of us outside the asylums only hide it a little better – and maybe not all that much better, after all.” King opens the essay by addressing the hard truth- we are all insane. People have dull lives, and often it’s the little bit of crazy within in us tha...
Green uses various literary elements, a few symbolic scenes, constant visual action along with the clever use of “action-reaction” format to let the text flow hence creating potential tension to make sure that the story isn’t dead at any point. The action is mentioned and the protagonist’s immediate reaction keeps the reader involved and complements each other heavily. Green drags the reader right into the text from the very beginning, and very skilfully keeps the reader engaged to the end of the introduction. With varied techniques to convey his message, Green is able to summarize the novel and grab attention in the few opening pages itself.
The Tell Tale Heart, written by Edgar Allan Poe, and Psycho, directed by Alfred Hitchcock were both formidable, revolutionary and horrifying creations to the audience’s of their times and to some extent, still are today. Hitchcock drew audiences in into his work by utilizing certain camera angles, mise-en-scene and diegetic and non-diegetic sounds. However, Edgar Allan Poe used a variety of literary techniques such as varying sentence structure, imagery and irony to draw his readers in. While these two masterpieces are unique in terms of content, both of them explore a prominent theme, fear.
For a very long time, authors have been writing bone chilling stories, most of which share similarities. Some of these similarities include crime, mystery, obsession, suspense and a “mad man” character. According to Merriam Webster, the full definition of the noun “horror” is “a very strong feeling of fear, dread, and shock”. An example of story that possesses such a characteristic is “The Tell Tale Heart” written by the father of horror himself, Edgar Allan Poe. Poe resided in Boston and Baltimore during the spooky 1800s and his work reveals the mood of the era. He lived a life of depression and death, which in effect, is reflected through most all of his work.
During the course of this class, I have had the opportunity to read literature from authors who come from different backgrounds and places in the world. Some of the stories and poetry we read were straight forward while others were confusing and sometimes required a second look. But one thing is clear, it changed the way I think about literature in a few ways that I wasn’t expecting. Three works in particular stand out in my mind. “ I Wont Let You Go” by Rabindranath Tagore, “To New York” by Leopold Senghor, and Pedro Peramo by Juan Rulfo all had an impact on my thinking for similar yet different reasons. They all incorporate their cultural backgrounds into their work through the setting of their pieces. They also compose their pieces in a way that makes you want to research their history to find the deeper meaning. Finally, a couple of the authors write about things they are emotionally connected to. Some of the examples we will look at, really opened my eyes to going beyond a superficial understanding of literature.
The writing of a memoir through the eyes of a child can produce a highly entertaining work, as proved by Wole Soyinka. Through the use of third person and the masterful use of the innocence and language of childhood, Soyinka has written a memoir that can make us remember what is was like to see the world through the eyes of a child.