Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain

Sacks tells the story of Clive Wearing, a musician who suffered severe amnesia after a brain infection. His memory lasted no more than a few seconds and seemed to reset whenever he blinked. Additionally, Clive’s memories of his past were almost completely wiped from his mind. He compared the experience to being dead, as he had no memory of ever having experienced anything. Clive attempted to keep a journal to impress continuity upon himself, but each entry was disjointed and contradictory. He frequently wrote that he’d just woken up even though he’d been awake for hours. For the first few months, Clive’s wife Deborah recalls, Clive was confused and sometimes even enthralled by what seemed to be magic tricks being performed before him, but he soon became acutely aware that something was deeply wrong, although he did not know what. This realization sent Clive into depression as he realized—and then realized again and again—that his life was forever changed and immobilized. When Clive’s wife visited him in the psychiatric institution, Clive seemed momentarily livened again, but would become desperate for her when she left. After six years of living in the institution, Clive’s wife fought to have him moved to a smaller and more personal care facility.