Customer Reviews

Musicophilia

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Oliver Sacks is one of the best popularizers and expositors of science around. I have read several of his books, and have each time learned remarkable new things about the human mind. His writing is very literary, and he often makes you take a new look at the ordinary everyday mental abilities and traits.

Appreciation and creation of music is one such human activity that most of us take for granted. Almost everyone appreciates music at some level, so music seems like one of the most fundamental of our instincts. However, if we just stop to think about music for a moment, we realize that it is a very peculiar thing to spend so much of our time and effort on. Music is the most abstract of all of the arts, and it is puzzling that we are so intrinsically drawn to it.

In "Musicophilia" Oliver Sacks brings his own expertise in neurology, as well as his keen amateur appreciation of music, to try to shed some light on our musical proclivities. The first part of the book centers on several case studies of people who had experienced major traumas to the parts of their brains. The damages that they suffered caused them to have some aspect of their musical experiences dramatically altered. Some have had persistent musical hallucinations, while other perceived musical pitches differently from the rest of us. These case studies, just like in the other of Sacks's books, serve to illustrate the deep underlying neurological basis of our musical aptitudes. The latter parts of the book deal with more general musical impairments, such as physical injuries that many musicians undergo, and the way that people cognitively respond to such situations.

One of the things that I always appreciated about Sacks's books is his writing style. It is much more literary than most other popular science books. It is also imbued with warmth and general sense of compassion for many of his patients and other people whose case histories he describes. Despite his keen analytical insights, one never gets the sense that he wants to reduce our human identity to just the neurological phenomena. It is a delicate balancing act, and Sacks manages to achieve it with utmost virtuosity.

...but a little long-winded. I kept hoping for more clearly drawn conclusions, but the author just kept on bringing up more and more examples of patients with specific problems. While the examples are interesting, I found the book to be a little too example-heavy -- and I wanted more in the way of conclusions about what these cases proved to him -- and the rest of us. A very interesting book overall, but it was less insightful than I hoped into the true power that music has and the role it can play in our lives.

I loved this book. It gives multiple examples of an area that is not generally covered in neuropsychology. It provides multiple examples of various types of neurological disorder having to do with music. If you've ever experienced musical hallucinations, a deterioration in he appreciation of music or any of the other conditions noted it will help with diagnostic clarification. Since I do evaluations of people I find it a handy reference.

Fascinating.

Adept.

Insightful.

The usual I expect from Sacks. The anecdotes were terrific, but I believe he is better at the anecdotal than he is at attempting to describe the larger theme in this book.

It did seem Sacks referred to his personal life at a significantly higher rate than ever. And reading the acknowledges would take a few minutes. He must have thanked several hundred people.

Which leads me to wonder if he isn't feeling this may be his last significant work. That he left his life long love of music so he could exit his writing on a crescendo.

Time will tell.

I enjoyed the first half of this book but the author eventually became mired down in long-winded stories and theories. It became a chore to read.

I love the subject of the book, and there are some pearls... but <<gasp>> I hate to criticize such a great author, but, well, there were times where I said aloud "Come on! Get on with it!" In my humble opinion, having never written a book, there were just too many examples of the same point. Should you buy it? Well, like I said, there are some really great pearls, but you just have to wade in to collect them.

What a fascinating, impressive book! Definitely my favorite of Sacks' writings! I hope that the medical community takes note, besides numerous valuable and intriguing tidbits for every reader!

Really? a $3 premium for Kindle version compared to paperback? Would love to read this, but not at this price for a Kindle version.

I was very pleased to see that the Kindle version has handled footnotes just like you would expect. Other publishers should take note --- a friend has Warren Buffet's book and was very disappointed in the accessibility of the footnotes.