The Complex Legacy of Oliver Sacks
The Oliver Sacks that the world came to know — the celebrated neurologist and prolific author of numerous best-selling books — was a figure admired globally, and I found myself captivated by him after our meeting in 2008 when he was 75 years old. A forthcoming collection of Oliver’s letters, nearly 350 of them spanning 55 years, from the age of 27 to 82, offers a richer, more nuanced portrait of the man often described in his later years as “the poet laureate of medicine.” Even I, who had the privilege of being his partner for the final six years of his life, discovered surprising revelations within these letters, which are set to be published next month for the very first time. Below this essay, you will find a selection of excerpts from these letters.
Episodes and stories I had certainly encountered in his autobiography On the Move come startlingly, vividly to life in the letters, illuminated as they are by the irrepressible now of Oliver’s voice. We find ourselves immersed in his mind, navigating his thoughts in the heat of the moment, as he diligently types out letter after letter on a typewriter or with a fountain pen (Oliver never embraced the digital age, never owning a computer, nor sending an email or text).
In 1965, a 31-year-old Oliver penned a letter to his parents regarding his application for a position at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx. He mentioned that the necessary letters of recommendation had been solicited and sent. In a display of self-deprecating humor, he included a mock quotation from an unnamed boss: “He arrives late, he rides a motorcycle, he dresses like a slob, but he possesses a good mind tucked away somewhere, and perhaps you’ll have better luck with him than we have had. I like him, but he has given me a lot of gray hairs.”
Oliver did secure the position and spent several years at Einstein and at Beth Abraham Hospital, where he encountered the patients who would later inspire his groundbreaking work in Awakenings. Yet, during this period, he struggled to find his footing, to forge friendships, or to truly belong. In a moment of desperation, he wrote a fevered letter to his beloved aunt, Len, questioning whether he might be grappling with schizophrenia, much like his older brother Michael.
- “Who am I? What sort of person am I? Beneath my glibness, my postures, and the facades I present, what is the real Oliver like? And, is there even a real Oliver?”
- He expressed, “I have always felt transparent, lacking substance, like a ghost — transient, homeless, or an outcast.”
It is often tempting to draw lessons from the lives of famous individuals. As Oliver’s partner, I carry not just a singular lesson, but an overwhelming sense of gratitude for the time we shared — a sentiment he too conveyed in his moving essay “My Own Life” and the other poignant pieces he penned for The New York Times towards the end of his life. For the multitude of readers who cherished him and his work, there may be a profound message about the nature of failure and the ever-present possibility of redemption.