On the Move
Oliver Sacks
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
On the Move
Oliver Sacks
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
Sacks’s empathy and intellectual curiosity, his delight in, as he calls it, 'joining particulars with generalities' and, especially, 'narratives with neuroscience' — have never been more evident than in his beautifully conceived new book, On The Move. This meta memoir, in which Sacks reconsiders aspects of his life and work that he’s written about in a dozen previous books, is remarkably candid and deeply affecting.
It is a fascinating account — a sort of extended case study, really — of Sacks’ remarkably active, iconoclastic adulthood.
He does not play down the anger of some patients who have felt betrayed by his portrayals of them, nor does he deny his frustration with wary ones who resisted being depicted.
...this is as close as we are likely to come to a classical autobiography, arranged in roughly chronological order and exhilaratingly punctuated with meditations on the life scientific, artistic, mechanical, pharmaceutical and erotic.
This memoir reveals Oliver Sacks as an even larger-than-life figure than I'd imagined.
...revelations about the state of his emotions are rare. He does not dwell on darkness. He never reveals how he broke his amphetamine addiction or what that felt like. He states in passing that he hasn't had sex in 35 years, but never remarks on what that means to him. Even when he acknowledges feeling isolated or hurt, he never lingers on the bad feelings. It's not until the book's end, where he writes with obvious joy about finding love, that he reveals the strong emotion that surely has been there all along..
Sacks assuredly outshines that sorrow with On The Move’s engaging narration and its easygoing frankness while unpacking personal details and some fresh insights gained from his earliest case studies.
On the Move is a glorious memoir that throws open that window and illuminates the world that we have seen through it. In this volume Sacks opens himself to recognition, much as he has opened the lives of others to being recognized in their fullness. In brief remarks on his almost 50 years of psychoanalysis, Sacks tells the reader that his analyst, Leonard Shengold, “has taught me about paying attention, listening to what lies beyond consciousness or words.” This is what Sacks has taught so many through his practice as a healer and through his work as a writer..
On the Move, his most intimate book, is passionate about many things -- motorcycling and weightlifting, science and medicine, family and friends. It is also remarkably candid about his homosexuality and a onetime four-year addiction to amphetamines.
One of the most enjoyable aspects of On the Move is the array of stories about the origins of Sacks’ many books. He shares his difficulties with writer’s block and depression. And he describes how some ideas evolved into books in unlikely ways.
The celebrated bard of the brain's quirks reveals a flamboyant secret life and a multitude of intellectual passions in this rangy, introspective autobiography.
Sacks writes candidly of his mother’s rage when she learned he was homosexual, and he ruefully recalls several brief love affairs.