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Awakenings  By  cover art

Awakenings

By: Oliver Sacks
Narrated by: Jonathan Davis,Oliver Sacks
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Publisher's Summary

Hailed as a medical classic, and the subject of a major feature film as well as radio and stage plays and various TV documentaries, Awakenings by Oliver Sacks is the extraordinary account of a group of 20 patients. 

Rendered catatonic by the sleeping-sickness epidemic that swept the world just after the First World War, all 20 had spent 40 years in hospital - motionless and speechless; aware of the world around them but exhibiting no interest in it - until Dr Sacks administered the then-new drug L-DOPA, which caused them, temporarily, to awake from their decades-long slumber.

©1973 Oliver Sacks (P)2011 Audible, Inc

Critic Reviews

"The story of a disease that plunged its victims into a prison of viscous time, and the drug that catapulted them out of it." (The Guardian)

What listeners say about Awakenings

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  • Khan
  • 12-04-21

Mesmerising

Amazing achievement!
The nature of the book requires active listening and can at times be a hard listen, that said it's definitely one that adds a nuance to the world as you know it.
You walk away feeling as though you too had visited the patients and seen the miraculous awakenings of Mount Carmel :)

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  • Client d'Amazon
  • 10-01-20

Enjoyably extended from the original, well read

Really enjoyed the book and the revisitations at the end of it, especially those concerned with the film and stage adaptation of Awakenings.

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  • Anonymous User
  • 09-22-20

Incredible!

This is the best of Oliver Sacks works that I have read so far. So deep, so complete..personality, physiology and pathology brought together.

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  • Amazon Customer
  • 12-11-22

a fascinating story

incredible case studies of human disease, hopefully never to be seen again. the descriptions may be too technical for the lay listener, but the broader picture is beautifully told