Oliver Sacks

"In July 2013, Oliver Sacks turned eighty and wrote [a] ... piece in The New York Times about the prospect of old age and the freedom he envisioned for himself in binding together the thoughts and feelings of a lifetime. Eighteen months later, he was given a diagnosis of terminal cancer--which he announced publicly in another piece in The New York Times. Gratitude is Sacks's meditation on why life [continued] to enthrall him even as he [faced] the all-too-close presence of his own death, and how to live out the months that [remained] in the richest and deepest way possible"--

Gratitude

Megan Parrott

Oddly enough, this was my first Oliver Sacks experience. More than anything, I love how he connects age to the periodic elements – I thought that was so beautiful. I will be reading more of his work

Sebagai neurosaintis, aku kira Oliver Sacks akan membahas bagaimana gratitude mempengaruhi otak. Ternyata ini memoir pendek yg beliau tulis sebelum meninggal. Kurang memorable tbh.

Alexandra Sklar

Marisel 

This is a compilation of essays Sacks wrote in his last year of life. It’s beautifully written in the usual, candid and heartfelt style that is typical of his writings. It’s a beautiful treatise about looking back at the end of one’s life. I see that I have used the word “beautiful” here multiple times— and I’m keeping that, because it is, just so beautiful. I read it in just over one sitting. I couldn’t put it down.

Nadine 

It's been many years since I last read an Oliver Sacks book (Music ) and I think I need to go back and revisit his oeuvre- beautifully and simply put a reflection on life and death

jam 🍯

I read all four essays during my morning commute to work, but their brevity only complements the poetry of each essay. Gratitude is something I am cultivating in my own life, and to read the joy and contentment of this accomplished writer bolsters my soul in a quiet way. The first essay, which was originally published in the New York Times, was my favorite and certainly one I hope to return to when I am in need of a bit more gratitude.

Luca Conti

Coley T

Beau

Carla Schwarze

Jem Cab

Sally Lu

Athiyya adristi

Jaël

Kyle Curry

logan chung

Andrei Stanciu

Duality Diva

"My predominant feeling is one of gratitude. I have loved and been loved. I have been given much and I have given something in return. Above all, I have been a sentient being, a thinking animal, on this beautiful planet, and that in itself has been an enormous privilege and adventure." --Oliver Sacks No writer has succeeded in capturing the medical and human drama of illness as honestly and as eloquently as Oliver Sacks. During the last few months of his life, he wrote a set of essays in which he movingly explored his feelings about completing a life and coming to terms with his own death. "It is the fate of every human being," Sacks writes, "to be a unique individual, to find his own path, to live his own life, to die his own death." Together, these four essays form an ode to the uniqueness of each human being and to gratitude for the gift of life. "Oliver Sacks was like no other clinician, or writer. He was drawn to the homes of the sick, the institutions of the most frail and disabled, the company of the unusual and the 'abnormal.' He wanted to see humanity in its many variants and to do so in his own, almost anachronistic way--face to face, over time, away from our burgeoning apparatus of computers and algorithms. And, through his writing, he showed us what he saw." --Atul Gawande, author of Being Mortal

Simon Lund Larsen

Keven Wang

Oliver Sacks died in August 2015 at his home in Greenwich Village, surrounded by his close friends and family. He was 82. He spent his final days doing what he loved: playing the piano, swimming, enjoying smoked salmon - and writing. As Dr Sacks looked back over his long, adventurous life his final thoughts were of gratitude. In a series of remarkable, beautifully written and uplifting meditations, Dr Sacks reflects on and gives thanks for a life well lived, and expresses his thoughts on growing old, facing terminal cancer and reaching the end. I cannot pretend I am without fear. But my predominant feeling is one of gratitude. I have loved and been loved; I have been given much and I have given something in return; I have read and travelled and thought and written. I have had an intercourse with the world, the special intercourse of writers and readers. Above all, I have been a sentient being, a thinking animal, on this beautiful planet, and that in itself has been an enormous privilege and adventure.

Gratitude

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