Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain

(Paperback)

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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.

Reviews

Fascinating. Music, as Sacks explains, 'can pierce the heart directly'. And this is the truth that he so brilliantly focuses upon that music saves, consoles and nourishes us. * Daily Mail *
An elegantly outlined series of case studies . . . which reveal the depth to which music grips so many people. * Observer *

Author Bio

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.