Oliver Sacks
Paperback | Pages: 337 pages Rating: 3.97 | 5368 Users | 564 Reviews
Be Specific About Books Supposing Uncle Tungsten (Oliver Sacks' memoirs #1)
| Original Title: | Uncle Tungsten |
| ISBN: | 0330390287 (ISBN13: 9780330390286) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Series: | Oliver Sacks' memoirs #1 |
| Literary Awards: | Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Prize for Nonfiction (2002) |
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In Uncle Tungsten Sacks evokes, with warmth and wit, his upbringing in wartime England. He tells of the large science-steeped family who fostered his early fascination with chemistry. There follow his years at boarding school where, though unhappy, he developed the intellectual curiosity that would shape his later life. And we hear of his return to London, an emotionally bereft ten-year-old who found solace in his passion for learning. Uncle Tungsten radiates all the delight and wonder of a boy’s adventures, and is an unforgettable portrait of an extraordinary young mind.‘If you did not think that gallium and iridium could move you, this superb book will change your mind’ The Times
‘The amalgamation of personal recollection and scientific history makes a luminous, inspiring book’ Sunday Telegraph
‘Uncle Tungsten is really about the raw joy of scientific understanding; what it is like to be a precocious child discovering the alchemical secrets of reality for the first time; the sheer thrill of finding intelligible patterns in nature’ Guardian
Particularize Based On Books Uncle Tungsten (Oliver Sacks' memoirs #1)
| Title | : | Uncle Tungsten (Oliver Sacks' memoirs #1) |
| Author | : | Oliver Sacks |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | First Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 337 pages |
| Published | : | August 23rd 2002 by Picador (first published 2001) |
| Categories | : | Science. Nonfiction. Autobiography. Memoir. Biography. Chemistry |
Rating Based On Books Uncle Tungsten (Oliver Sacks' memoirs #1)
Ratings: 3.97 From 5368 Users | 564 ReviewsEvaluation Based On Books Uncle Tungsten (Oliver Sacks' memoirs #1)
Great fun romping inside the mind of Oliver Sacks as he reminisces of childhood days. Insightful, funny, sometimes somber, sometimes lighthearted, always engaging. What strikes me as its most important quality is that it bears a restorative effect on those minds seeking to explain their own childhoods. A great story-teller, of course, and he has produced a well-crafted literary work.Everything that I would write would be a spoiler, of course, because it is a memoir so I'm just adding my voice toI read this, a chapter at a time, as bedtime reading for my 11-year-old son, who is very much into science, and said son is now fascinated with chemistry, its history, and all the people that were involved in many of the theories that have been proved.I am struck by Sack's language throughout, the lyrical quality with which he describes a unique home life in London during the Second World War, the chemical explorations of his boyhood (my son was especially struck by the idea of another
i do not understand science. most phenomena i just dismiss with accusations of magic: the moon controls the tides?? but they are so far away!! oh, maaaagic!! leap year?? account for thyself!! magic?? got it. how did you make this pluot, sir?? ah, i see you are an alchemist!much of it i have to blame on my high schooling because i have not studied any aspect of the sciences since then, but it's not like i have gone out of my way to do any research now that i am grown. i mean,they do make books
This is Sacks' inspiring memoir of his early teenage years, when his growing scientific mind recapitulated the history of chemistry through reading and his own hands-on experiments. It can be read either as a record of one person's education, or as a high-level history of chemistry. The magic of this book is how Sacks combined the two into an engaging narrative.He begins by telling of his earliest observations, when not yet ten years old, of simple material categories. This grew into
Wonderfully inspiring, even more so because the book revolves around the great love of mine - chemistry.Through his memories of childhood/adolescence Oliver Sacks tells the simplified (short?) version of the history of chemistry. I've come to realize that his "reasons" for chemical curiosity are rather similar to my own - to find certainty in this world, to understand the origins and reactions of things all around me, and so I was not enthralled to read the last chapter, "The End of the Affair",
This is a five-star jealousy rating. Oh, to have had the intellectual riches of Oliver Sacks' childhood. It's not possible anymore, even if you have equally intelligent, indulgent, slightly disconnected parents, who let him do what he wished, when he wished, how he wished--allowing him, over years, to play in an under-the-stairs chemistry lab, where he nearly blew himself and the house sky-high many times. Safety glasses? Fire protection? Concerns about poisonous fumes? Never mind! And how pale
I went on a mini-Sacks "bender" this year, reading Uncle Tugsten, Musicophilia, and then dipping into one of his earlier books (An Anthropologist on Mars). What I have always loved about Sacks is his ability to present the scientific, social, personal and emotional aspects of his subject as a balanced entity. You can see, through his writings, how he develops a rapport with his patients. Uncle Tungsten is a memoir of Sacks, growing up in Britain under the Blitz, a child of a remarkable family.
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