When Breath Becomes Air

Posted on 22 October 2017 by Paul Kalanithi

For readers of Atul Gawande, Andrew Solomon, and Anne Lamott, a profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir by a young neurosurgeon faced with a terminal cancer diagnosis who attempts to answer the question What makes a life worth living At the age of thirty six, on the verge of completing a decade s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi s transformation from a na ve medical student possessed, as he wrote, by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality What makes life worth living in the face of death What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything, he wrote Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head I can t go on I ll go on When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both. Free Read When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi For Kindle ePUB or eBook – kino-fada.fr As I finished this book with tears running down my face I asked myself, Why did you read this book You know it was going to be sad, how could a man dying of lung cancer before the age of forty be anything but Yet to just classify this memoir, to classify this novel as such is to devalue the man he was He was a lover of literature, a neurosurgeon, a scientist, a son and brother, a husband and father He tried to live each day to the best of his ability, he helped many and he acknowledged the As I finished this book with tears running down my face I asked myself, Why did you read this book You know it was going to be sad, how could a man dying of lung cancer before the age of forty be anything but Yet to just classify this memoir, to classify this novel as such is to devalue the man he was He was a l...A gasping, desperate, powerful little book, bigger on the inside than outside It s a little bit about dying, butabout being alive.I finished the book I m glad that I perservered with it It s quite an odd book and an overall rating might be the sum of the parts, but is not going to reflect the writing or content of those parts.The first part, the foreword, by Abraham Verghese, was verbose, hagiographic and contradictory view spoiler ie full of shit hide spoiler He said he didn t know the author at all until after his death Then he says well he did meet him and they had a long email correspondence And so it goes I finished the book I m glad that I perservered with it It s quite an odd book and an overall rating might be the sum of the parts, but is not going to reflect the writing or content of those parts.The first part, the foreword, by Abraham Verghese, was verbose, hagiographic and contradictory view spoiler ie full of shit hide spoiler He said he didn t know the author at all until after his death Then he says well he did meet him and they had a long email correspondence And so it goes He says it s the foreword but should be the afterword Verghese must have sat there with a thesaurus composing endless sentences of praise for the author, who had, like most of us, never accomplished anything much out of the ordinary I dnf d this part and give it a whole, rounded up 1 star.The second part, I feel churlish writing this, I really do The author had an interesting career in his short life, mostly as a student He h...Oh dear I was always told not to speak ill of the dead It feels awful to give a three star rating to a nice guy by all accounts who is now dead But I simply did not find this book compelling or insightful enough It is mildly interesting to learn about neurosurgery as a specialty and to read the author s thoughts as he faced diagnosis, illness and then death I always felt that the author was holding back that it was too clinical, too calm, just not passionate enough The first time I felt Oh dear I was always told not to speak ill of the dead It feels awful to give a three star rating to a nice guy by all accounts who is now dead But I simply did not find ...I don t think you should read this book because the story of an incredibly gifted man who had his life taken away at such a young age might give you the motivation to live lifefully I think you should read this book because that talented, inspiring man has incredibly important things to say derived from his own experiences, and it s important to listen and learn from them Read this book with the knowledge that you might not always be able to understand everything someone goes through, bu I don t think you should read this book because the story of an incredibly gifted man who had his life taken away at such a young age might give you the motivation to live lifefully I think you should read this book b...Sharing this interesting New York Times interview with Dr Lucy Kalanithi.She sounds like a very special person too Upgrading this to 5 stars, not sure why I didn t before After finishing this profound, emotional memoir I feel like I lost a good friend.Thank you Paul Kalanithi for this beautiful gift you left for us, wherever you are Paul Kalanithi Baby Ca Sharing this interesting New York Times inte...1 12 16 Update Just wanted to mention that this book goes on sale today Its an amazing story Paul Kalanithi studied literature at Stanford University For his thesis, he studied the work of Walt Whitman, a poet , who a century before, was possessed by the same questions that haunted him Kalanithi wanted to find a way to understand and describe what he termed the Physiological Spiritual Man Kalanithi ha...I read this almost two months ago and realized I never reviewed it When I finished the book, I just couldn t review it It s a small book, but it s powerful I didn t shed any tears at the end of it, but I remember sitting there physically shaking and feeling really numb and tingly A book has never impacted me that way before, and I m not even sure why I read the book in the first place since I knew what I was getting myself into Wait, I know why I wanted to read it It was very therapeutic f I read this almost two months ago and realized I never reviewed it When I finished the book, I just couldn t review it It s a small book, but it s powerful I didn t shed any tears at the end of it, but I remember sitting there physically shaking and feeling really numb and tingly A book has never impacted me that way before, and I m not even sure why I read the book in the first place since I knew what I was getting myself into Wait, I know why I wanted to read it It was very therapeutic for me I don t want to pull back the curtain too far on my life, but I ve seen the havoc cancer causes out of nowhere in people s lives People very close to me I ve held my grandmother s hand as she took her last breath after battling pancreatic ...Unforgettable is what Verghese says in his foreword I agree and am fighting for my own breath to write my thoughts about this stunning memoir that has left me gasping for air The writing The emotion The beauty in the darkness of dying I mourn the death of this writer, a surgeon of great potential A doctor of great compassion But the message he has left us is quite eloquently simple make life as meaningful as you can in the time you have Be grateful The touching epilogue his wife Lucy w Unforgettable is what Verghese says in his foreword I agree and am fighting for my own breath to write my thoughts about this stunning memoir that has left me gasping for air The writing The emotion The beauty in the darkness of dying I mourn the death of this writer, a surgeon of great potential A doctor of great compassion But the message he has left us is quite eloquently simple make life as meani...Never has a book turned me into a sad sobbing mess so quickly Philosophical, beautiful, moving, difficult, heartbreaking Highly, HIGHLY recommend.

English
22 October 2017

Paul Kalanithi