No Man Alone: A Neurosurgeon's Life [Hardcover]

Wilder Penfield (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Little, Brown and Company; 1st edition (September 30, 1977)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0316698393
• ISBN-13: 978-0316698399
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 5.6 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,154,075 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Life of a cerebral cartographer., June 17, 2000

By 

neurotome "neurotome" (San Luis Obispo, CA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

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This review is from: No Man Alone: A Neurosurgeon's Life (Hardcover)

You don't have to learn a little bit about neuroscience to understand why Wilder Penfield, M.D., was so important. You don't have to appreciate the contrast between the ridiculous 19th-century field of phrenology and the eloquent experimental data summarized in Penfield and Jasper's landmark _Functional Anatomy of the Human Brain_ to understand what the name Penfield means in neuroscience today.

In fact, even a casual reading of Rudy Rucker reveals jacked-in cybernauts, their neurosurgeons doubtless Penfield's spiritual descendants.

The work stands on its own, and this autobiography will barely touch on it, or the turbulent relationship between Penfield and Jasper (the latter is barely mentioned.) But if your question is, "Who was that man," this book provides the answer.

If you're not interested in an out-of-print book, there's a book called "Something Hidden," by Penfield's grandson, that covers much the same ground; in fact, whole chapters are practically lifted word-for-word with only the person changed from first to third.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars No Man Alone: A Surgeon's Life, March 5, 2009

By 

Horia Ples MD - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: No Man Alone: A Neurosurgeon's Life (Hardcover)

The book is somehow the final countdown regarding the many sided activities of one of the most prolific writers from the branch of the neurosurgery, as one part of the title suggests. But it is more than a neurosurgeon's life, even if it tells us a lot about its scientific foundations. It is also the story about the countless people involved more or less in the long, rich and surprisingly diverse life of the author, as the first part of the title indicates. In a certain way, the main idea of the book is related to one single aspect of Wilder Penfield's enterprises: the foundation of the Montreal Neurological Institute (known also as MNI). All the roads of professional and personal life of Penfield bring us into the very day of the opening of the institute, after decades of wandering across the American and European continent. We have just one extra final part, called "Epilogue", where the modesty of the author can be guessed. Even if Penfield was the vision and the executive of the MNI project, he is considering that the story of the institute, after its foundation, must be written by "someone else". So was to be: death came soon after the moment of ending the Preface. In this way, the book is a book of farewell, not only the very many people named or not named in the book, starting from members of his family, scientists including Nobel Prize laureates, members of the medical staff including technicians, nurses and orderlies, but also from wild forests, lakes and rivers. We have to notice also the ocean, where Penfield was close to a premature end during the First World War.
From another point of view, the book is an ocean in itself. But not all its contours are visible from the beginning. One has to look after, sometimes with a microscope, sometimes with a telescope. So I did myself. In this sense the book is just an introduction in many directions of study, including the study of the human dimensions of an exemplary career.
Eugen Goaga MD PhD

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A story of dedication and determination, September 14, 2011

By 

Renee, RN - See all my reviews

This review is from: No Man Alone: A Neurosurgeon's Life (Hardcover)

As a former patient of the Montreal Neurological Institute which Penfield founded I found this book to be an amazing story of determination. Dr. Penfield traveled all over the world and studied with various scientists to create a hospital and institution that could study diseases such as epilepsy. I find the dedication to research and patient care that began at the MNI in 1934 is exceptional and still exists with their current staff doctors such as William Feindel, MD and Brenda Milner, MD both 93 years old and still very active in research. Montreal has the best Neurological Institution in the world. It was very interesting to read this book to see how it all got started.