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A review by shorshewitch
When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
5.0
When Breath becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi
My rating: An extremely emotional 5/5
Highly recommended
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Its turbulent. I am distraught. I was not meaning to pick it up. I just downloaded the book and was browsing through the first pages of books to determine which one should I start next from my e-books. I went through the prologue and I started sobbing uncontrollably in spite of not having read even 2% of the book yet. After that it was no turning back. It took me time to grasp certain scientific and medical nomenclatures but I caught up nonetheless not wanting to give up at all. I went till the end and finished the book in one sitting, occassionally looking around, trying to wipe a spilled tear, trying to wrap my brain around the desperation and inevitability of things that were written in there.
I work in a bank and when I was thrown on the floor for OJT or On Job Training, I realized the difference between theory and practice - when you have to start dealing with real money rather than some simulated systems of virtual moolah. It is huge. And the ones who train us have no idea of the enormity of the situation. Life is like that. What is learnt in theory, doesn't apply in practice. Paul Kalanithi's life is a paradoxical "living" example of death and this mammoth difference between theory and practice. Life doesn't prepare one for the doom, no matter how inexorable it is. Nothing ever prepares one for it even if one had seemingly prepared enough. And yet here he was - a neurosurgeon facing this inescabale truth - trying to fight it in the face - like his wife writes, not out of resignation, not out of heroism - merely because it has to be fought.
This is a story of a 36 year old, young, dynamic, ambitious man, standing right in the face of the very demon that he had anticipated curing forever through extensive experimental research. He had done his Masters in both Neuroscience and Literature and he was going to harp the assets of both into creating a better world. Like his wife writes - What happened to Paul was tragic, yet it wasn't a tragedy.
Paul's story was left mid-way, but it is complete in its own reality. His wife's addition as an epilogue rendered me completely incongruent for a few hours before I started typing this review.
This book is not to question or to preach. There is not a single reference of self pity or denial or extreme humility or anything that can take away the essence of looking into life right in the eye. It is just a book written about standing at the doorway, between life and death, staring at the absurdity of it with all the rationality one can muster - whether the person himself or the ones surrounding him.
It was terrible trouble to hold myself calm as the end of the book neared - I bow down to the strength of this entire family.
And Paul, if you are reading this by any chance, here is to tell you, that you have helped all of us with a grave answer to a oftenly asked question - Why me?, when you asked, Why NOT me? You taught us that it can be anyone of us - anytime. And that is a life changing truth despite its morbidity. Thank you.
I will leave you with the quotes that are gut wrenchingly beautiful especially if read in the context of the calamity (These are but a few only) -
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"You that seek what life is in death, Now find it air that once was breath. New names unknown, old names gone: Till time end bodies, but souls none. Reader! then make time, while you be, But steps to your eternity."
"I still felt literature provided the best account of the life of the mind, while neuroscience laid down the most elegant rules of the brain. "
"Brains give rise to our ability to form relationships and make life meaningful. Sometimes, they break."
"When there’s no place for the scalpel, words are the surgeon’s only tool."
"In taking up another’s cross, one must sometimes get crushed by the weight."
(Chapter:Part I: In Perfect Health I Begin)
"Our patients’ lives and identities may be in our hands, yet death always wins. "
"The truth that you live one day at a time didn’t help: What was I supposed to do with that day?"
"It can be as uncomfortable as it is peaceful, both communal and lonely—like death, like grief—but there is beauty in all of it, and I think this is good and right."
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My rating: An extremely emotional 5/5
Highly recommended
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Its turbulent. I am distraught. I was not meaning to pick it up. I just downloaded the book and was browsing through the first pages of books to determine which one should I start next from my e-books. I went through the prologue and I started sobbing uncontrollably in spite of not having read even 2% of the book yet. After that it was no turning back. It took me time to grasp certain scientific and medical nomenclatures but I caught up nonetheless not wanting to give up at all. I went till the end and finished the book in one sitting, occassionally looking around, trying to wipe a spilled tear, trying to wrap my brain around the desperation and inevitability of things that were written in there.
I work in a bank and when I was thrown on the floor for OJT or On Job Training, I realized the difference between theory and practice - when you have to start dealing with real money rather than some simulated systems of virtual moolah. It is huge. And the ones who train us have no idea of the enormity of the situation. Life is like that. What is learnt in theory, doesn't apply in practice. Paul Kalanithi's life is a paradoxical "living" example of death and this mammoth difference between theory and practice. Life doesn't prepare one for the doom, no matter how inexorable it is. Nothing ever prepares one for it even if one had seemingly prepared enough. And yet here he was - a neurosurgeon facing this inescabale truth - trying to fight it in the face - like his wife writes, not out of resignation, not out of heroism - merely because it has to be fought.
This is a story of a 36 year old, young, dynamic, ambitious man, standing right in the face of the very demon that he had anticipated curing forever through extensive experimental research. He had done his Masters in both Neuroscience and Literature and he was going to harp the assets of both into creating a better world. Like his wife writes - What happened to Paul was tragic, yet it wasn't a tragedy.
Paul's story was left mid-way, but it is complete in its own reality. His wife's addition as an epilogue rendered me completely incongruent for a few hours before I started typing this review.
This book is not to question or to preach. There is not a single reference of self pity or denial or extreme humility or anything that can take away the essence of looking into life right in the eye. It is just a book written about standing at the doorway, between life and death, staring at the absurdity of it with all the rationality one can muster - whether the person himself or the ones surrounding him.
It was terrible trouble to hold myself calm as the end of the book neared - I bow down to the strength of this entire family.
And Paul, if you are reading this by any chance, here is to tell you, that you have helped all of us with a grave answer to a oftenly asked question - Why me?, when you asked, Why NOT me? You taught us that it can be anyone of us - anytime. And that is a life changing truth despite its morbidity. Thank you.
I will leave you with the quotes that are gut wrenchingly beautiful especially if read in the context of the calamity (These are but a few only) -
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"You that seek what life is in death, Now find it air that once was breath. New names unknown, old names gone: Till time end bodies, but souls none. Reader! then make time, while you be, But steps to your eternity."
"I still felt literature provided the best account of the life of the mind, while neuroscience laid down the most elegant rules of the brain. "
"Brains give rise to our ability to form relationships and make life meaningful. Sometimes, they break."
"When there’s no place for the scalpel, words are the surgeon’s only tool."
"In taking up another’s cross, one must sometimes get crushed by the weight."
(Chapter:Part I: In Perfect Health I Begin)
"Our patients’ lives and identities may be in our hands, yet death always wins. "
"The truth that you live one day at a time didn’t help: What was I supposed to do with that day?"
"It can be as uncomfortable as it is peaceful, both communal and lonely—like death, like grief—but there is beauty in all of it, and I think this is good and right."
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