The River of Consciousness

By: Oliver Sacks

Narrated by: Dan Woren, Kate Edgar

From the best-selling author of Gratitude, On the Move, and Musicophilia, a collection of essays that displays Oliver Sacks's passionate engagement with the most compelling and seminal ideas of human endeavor: evolution, creativity, memory, time, consciousness, and experience.

Oliver Sacks, a scientist and a storyteller, is beloved by readers for the extraordinary neurological case histories (Awakenings, An Anthropologist on Mars) in which he introduced and explored many now familiar disorders--autism, Tourette's syndrome, face blindness, savant syndrome. He was also a memoirist who wrote with honesty and humor about the remarkable and strange encounters and experiences that shaped him (Uncle Tungsten, On the Move, Gratitude). Sacks, an Oxford-educated polymath, had a deep familiarity not only with literature and medicine but with botany, animal anatomy, chemistry, the history of science, philosophy, and psychology. The River of Consciousness is one of two books Sacks was working on up to his death, and it reveals his ability to make unexpected connections, his sheer joy in knowledge, and his unceasing, timeless project to understand what makes us human.

Read by Dan Woren, with the Dedication and Foreword read by Kate Edgar

Interesting content, uneven pacing

Overall a very good mix of anecdote and fact/science. The pacing was a bit uneven; some if the chapters got off to a slow start. It was very entertaining.

Important but Less Interesting

This was written based upon an outline and notes from Oliver Sacks after his death and is quite a bit more rambling that most of Sacks' books. This book is about the brain and quirks of brain processing but is very different from most Sacks' books. It seems the underlying theme is the dysfunction of science blinded by prevalent theories and the old ideas of influential scientists. The book describes how these influences can stymie scientific progress for decades leaving well meaning scientists effectively blind to obvious evidence right before their eyes.

Perhaps this is Sacks' most important book but it was not the most interesting or compelling of his books.

This was worth reading, but I would read everything else by Sacks first.

Fantastic book

Thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. What an amazing man. Highly recommended.I am now reading “On the Move”

intriguing storytelling

I wasn't sure about this in the beginning however the mear smoothness of the reader kept me wanting to listen after that I was hooked on the information as well. I will be reading more Oliver Sacks in the future.

great book, not a fan of Woren

love the content, classic sacks. Dan Woren is not really my style, turns out he historically voices comic book type stuff which I think suits him better than Sacks. oh well