Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain

Description

Arousing, inspiring, comforting - music is capable of stimulating both passion and compassion, speaking to our very core and taking us to the heights or depths of emotion. In Musicophilia, Oliver Sacks explores this phenomenon through various case studies, including a surgeon who is struck by lightning and subsequently becomes obsessed with Chopin. Describing how music can animate people with Parkinson's Disease, can give words to stroke patients, or calm those disorientated by Alzheimer's or schizophrenia, Sacks uses the example of music, and stories of individual experience, to illuminate the universal human condition.

Oliver Sacks is a physician and the author of ten previous books, of which Musicophilia is the most recent. He lives in New York City, where he is Professor of Neurology and Psychiatry at Columbia University. He is the first, and only, Columbia University Artist, and is also a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians. In 2008, he was appointed Commander of the British Empire.

"Oliver Sacks is that rare creature, a respected man of science who is also a mean storyteller." --"Toronto Star" "From the Hardcover edition."