The River of Consciousness
The essays Sacks chose two weeks before he died: Darwin flowers, Freud as neurologist, memory and plagiarism, and the speed at which perception actually runs.
Two weeks before his death Sacks settled the contents of this collection, which ranges wider than anything else he published. He writes on Darwin orchids, on Freud early career as a neurologist, on how memory quietly plagiarises, and on the speed at which perception actually runs. The through-line is not medicine but method: how science changes its mind.
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Maria Popova
That is what Oliver Sacks (July 9, 1933–August 30, 2015) explores with his signature gift for bridging matter and meaning in the title essay of his altogether revelatory posthumous collection The River of Consciousness (public library), fusing his decades of medical practice as a neurologist studying how the brain works with a philosopher’s inquiry into what a mind is and a poet’s gift for rendering what it means to be alive.
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