SOURCE: McRae, Murdo William. “Oliver Sacks's Neurology of Identity.” In The Literature of Science: Perspectives on Popular Scientific Writing, edited by Murdo William McRae, pp. 97-110. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 1993.

In the following essay, McRae traces the origins of Sacks's “neurology of identity,” a term given to his treatment of neurological patients as individuals.

It is impossible not to respect and admire Oliver Sacks, successful neurologist and best-selling author of five books, one of them the basis for Penny Marshall's popular 1990 film Awakenings. Once himself a victim of neurological impairment, Sacks displays immense sympathy and compassion for his patients, many of whom have endured lives of unimaginable suffering. Stylistically and rhetorically vigorous, even audacious at times, his philosophically sophisticated prose contains a virtually encyclopedic range of allusions, not only to neurologists such as Henry Head or Hughlings Jackson, but also to philosophers and poets such as...