Reaching down the rabbit hole

Emma — Thu, 02 Jan 2025 00:00:00 +0000

*Updated and revised edition, with a new epilogue and interview with Michael J Fox*’Engagingly written, informative, often funny’ Daily Telegraph’Has the hard-boiled style of a Raymond Chandler novel’ The Times’Think Oliver Sacks meets Gregory House, with a sprinkling of a hypochondriac’s worst nightmare’ Sunday TimesWhat is it like to try to heal the body when the mind is under attack? In this gripping and illuminating book, Dr Allan Ropper reveals the extraordinary stories behind some of the life-altering afflictions that he and his staff are confronted with at the Neurology Unit of Harvard’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital.Like Alice in Wonderland, Dr Ropper inhabits a place where absurdities abound: a sportsman who starts spouting gibberish; an undergraduate who suddenly becomes psychotic; a mother who has to decide whether a life locked inside her own head is worth living. How does one begin to treat such cases, to counsel people whose lives may be changed forever? Dr Ropper answers these questions by taking the reader into a world where lives and minds hang in the balance.

How the Brain Lost its Mind

Emma — Thu, 07 Jan 2021 00:00:00 +0000

‘Hugely entertaining’ Guardian’Fascinating’ Mail on SundayIn 1882, Jean-Martin Charcot was the premiere physician in Paris, having just established a neurology clinic at the infamous SalpÃ¯ ¿ ½triÃ¯ ¿ ½re Hospital, a place that was called a ‘grand asylum of human misery’. Assessing the dismal conditions, he quickly upgraded the facilities, and in doing so, revolutionized the treatment of mental illness. Many of Charcot’s patients had neurosyphilis (the advanced form of syphilis), a disease of mad poets, novelists, painters, and musicians, and a driving force behind the overflow of patients in Europe’s asylums. A sexually transmitted disease, it is known as ‘the great imitator’ since its symptoms resemble those of almost any biological disease or mental illness. It is also the perfect lens through which to peel back the layers to better understand the brain and the mind. Yet, Charcot’s work took a bizarre turn when he brought mesmerism – hypnotism – into his clinic, abandoning his pursuit of the biological basis of illness in favour of the far sexier and theatrical treatment of female ‘hysterics’, whose symptoms mimic those seen in brain disease, but were elusive in origin. This and a general fear of contagion set the stage for Sigmund Freud, whose seductive theory, Freudian analysis, brought sex and hysteria onto the psychiatrist couch, leaving the brain behind. How The Brain Lost Its Mind tells this rich and compelling story, and raises a host of philosophical and practical questions. Are we any closer to understanding the difference between a sick mind and a sick brain? The real issue remains: where should neurology and psychiatry converge to explore not just the brain, but the nature of the human psyche?

Ropper, Allan H. – The Bell Bookshop

Reaching down the rabbit hole

How the Brain Lost its Mind