

On the Move
A Life
Author: Oliver Sacks
Narrator: Dan Woren
Unabridged: 11 hr 53 min
Format: Digital Audiobook Download
Publisher: Random House Audio
Published: 04/28/2015
Author: Oliver Sacks
Narrator: Dan Woren
Unabridged: 11 hr 53 min
Format: Digital Audiobook Download
Publisher: Random House Audio
Published: 04/28/2015
Oliver Sacks is a practicing physician and the author of twelve books, including The Mind's Eye, Musicophilia, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, and Awakenings (which inspired the Oscar-nominated film). He lives in New York City, where he is a professor of neurology at the NYU School of Medicine.
Neurologist. Doctor. Author. Pianist. Motorcycle enthusiast. Amateur weightlifter. Oliver Sacks packed a lot of life into his 82 years (he died in August). And this incredible volume, the second part of his memoirs (the first is 2001’s Uncle Tungsten), chronicles his busy, fascinating adult life: Oxf......more
An essential endnote for the indefatigable Sacks reader. Recommended with brio. However, those just starting on the Sacks oeuvre are probably best off with The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Awakenings, The Island of the Colorblind or An Anthropologist on Mars. Read and be reborn.......more
Note: I wrote this review in May, 2015, then let it sit until today when I heard that Oliver Sacks just passed away. I have not re-edited the text to reflect that sad fact. This is a book that I could not put down until I finished it, save for six hours of sleep overnight. For Dr. Oliver Sack's most p......more
Maybe 2.5 stars. I had mixed emotions about this book, especially the last half of it, which devolved from an interesting narrative of young manhood into a lot of tedious name-checking and humblebragging. It's worth mentioning up front that, while I've been a faithful reader of Oliver Sacks's fascina......more
**A New York Times Notable Book of 2015**
Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
“Dr. Sacks writes not only with a doctor’s understanding of medicine and science but also with a Chekhovian sympathy for his patients and a metaphysical appreciation of their emotional quandaries....That writing, which Dr. Sacks says gives him a pleasure ‘unlike any other,’ has also been a gift to his readers—of erudition, sympathy and an abiding understanding of the joys, trials and consolations of the human condition.”
Lauren Slater, Los Angeles Review of Books
“The summation of a life lived with so much breadth and depth that it serves as a primer for how to navigate human existence with humor, humility, passion, speed, intelligence, and ongoing grace — the tale tying together all the stories Sacks has published in his lifetime…. In this book, Sacks reveals himself as a writer, laying bare the process, which was sometimes exquisitely painful and sometimes straightforward; it’s a rare behind-the-scenes glimpse into how one of this country’s most beloved physicians and authors actually plies his craft....Sacks is so vulnerable, so naked, so exposed in the telling of his life that the reader wants to fall in love with him, because what else can you do when a person such as Sacks gives you the gift of such honesty?…. On the Move can be read in many different ways…. In the end, though, what the reader walks away with, or rather, what this reader walked away with, was a field guide on how to live an excellent life, moment by moment, mile by mile, making each droplet count.”
Colin McGinn, Wall Street Journal
“This is a very striking book by a very striking man. It is honest, lucid, passionate, humorous, humane and human (also slightly Martian). The Oliver Sacks you thought you knew may surprise you with his back story…”
Carmela Ciuraru, San Francisco Chronicle
“No matter what he writes about — whether struggling to understand what his patients are going through, or describing his love of swimming or photography — Sacks always seems open to learning more. He appears keenly interested in everything and everyone he encounters. He’s a wonderful storyteller, a gift he says he inherited from his parents, both of whom were doctors. But as he proves again in his latest…book, it’s his keen attentiveness as a listener and observer, and his insatiable curiosity, that makes his work so powerful.”
Heller McAlpin, LA Times
“On the Move is filled with both wonder and wonderments….Sacks’ discursive, revealing memoir chronicles his surprising route to becoming the bard of brain disorders. Pit stops along the way include his biker days (in which he went by his middle name, Wolf), avid weightlifting, experimentation with psychotropic drugs leading to amphetamine addiction, numerous brushes with death, lifelong passion for long-distance swims, and so many carelessly lost manuscripts you can’t help but wonder about Freudian slips. The vivid self-portrait that emerges is of an immoderate risk taker with a brilliant ‘wildly associative mind,’ an enthusiast who regards ‘all neurology, everything as a sort of adventure.’ A teacher’s astute assessment best sums up Sacks’ nature: ‘Sacks will go far, if he does not go too far.’ He has frequently pushed the limits.”
Suzanne Koven, Boston Globe
“Sacks’ empathy and intellectual curiosity, his delight in, as he calls it, ‘joining particulars with generalities’ and, especially, ‘narratives with neuroscience’ —have never been more evident than in his beautifully conceived new book, On The Move. This meta memoir, in which Sacks reconsiders aspects of his life and work that he’s written about in a dozen previous books, is remarkably candid and deeply affecting.”
Colette Bancroft, Tampa Bay Times
“On the Move is entertaining and illuminating and sometimes shocking, and it’s given a deep tinge of poignancy by Sacks’ public announcement in February that he has terminal cancer. If On the Move is his effort, at age 81 and in the face of death, to record a life well lived, he has succeeded beautifully.”
Laura Miller, Salon
“On the Move is an enchanting window on just how much vitality you can pack into four-score years on this planet…"
Tyghe Trimble, Men’s Journal
“What you likely don’t know about Sacks is that he once held a weightlifting record in California, is a serious motorcycle enthusiast, and fell in love at 77. Such moments make On the Move a compelling read. The memoir offers a glimpse into one of the greatest minds of our time, made all the more special by the knowledge that it’s one of his last gifts to a devoted readership.”
Jennie Yabroff, Biographile
“You finish On the Move with a sense of wonder and admiration.”
Melissa Pierson, Daily Beast
“…an unforgettably passionate, joyous journey.”
Jeff Milo, Paste
“An ebullient telling of a remarkable life.”
Dan Cryer, Newsday
“Learning to come to terms with unique patients has given Oliver Sacks permission to come to terms with himself. And what a self this book reveals! A man animated by boundless curiosity, wide-ranging intelligence, gratitude for flawed humanity, perseverance despite setbacks…. Oliver Sacks can never be replaced. We’re lucky to have all the books, including On the Move. It’s intensely, beautifully, incandescently alive."
Alden Mudge, BookPage
“In these pages, Sacks is always on the move, leaping adroitly from one topic to the next. We are swept along by the velocity of his account of a long and eventful life.”