Review 269: The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales by Oliver Sacks
My rating: 3 of 5 stars



This book was something I heard about a long while ago, while still in school. From what I remember it made a splash, was popular and became just intriguing to me. It was in the back of my mind to read it someday. Well, decades later now I finally did, and  I'm slightly disappointed.

 This was not my first book by Oliver Sacks and his later books are better written for a lay audience. This one felt like he wasn't sure who would read his book, so half jargon and half not and it doesn't quite work. Let alone the way the clinical tales are told. Also, I don't think the book aged well with some of the language used in the book are with words we don't generally use anymore.

Entirely too short clinical tales mostly just describe the odd symptoms. There are some with the attempt to find out what has gone wrong, and how to fix, but most are short and seem to just say – look at this odd thing that happened to someone.