For readers of Atul Gawande's Being Mortal and Henry Marsh's Do No Harm, an unforgettably powerful and heart-breaking book about how to live.
PAUL KALANITHI was a neurosurgeon and writer. He held degrees in English literature, human biology, and history and philosoiphy of science and medicine from Stanford and Cambridge universities before graduating from Yale School of Medicine. He also received the American Academy of Neuirological Surgery's highest award for research. His reflections on doctoring and illness have been published in the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Paris Review Daily. Kalanithi died in March 2015, aged 37. He is survived by his wife, Lucy, and their daughter, Elizabeth Acadia.
"A vital book about dying. Awe-inspiring and exquisite. Obligatory
reading for the living."
*Nigella Lawson*
"Rattling. Heartbreaking. Beautiful."
*Atul Gawande, author of BEING MORTAL*
"A great, indelible book ... as intimate and illuminating as Atul
Gawande’s “Being Mortal,” to cite only one recent example of a
doctor’s book that has had exceptionally wide appeal ... I
guarantee that finishing this book and then forgetting about it is
simply not an option ... gripping from the start ... None of it is
maudlin. Nothing is exaggerated. As he wrote to a friend: “It’s
just tragic enough and just imaginable enough.” And just important
enough to be unmissable."
*New York Times*
"Powerful and poignant."
*The Sunday Times*
"Less a memoir than a reflection on life and purpose… A vital
book."
*The Economist*
"Extraordinary…Remarkable… luminous, revelatory memoir about
mortality and what makes being alive meaningful ... Lyrical,
intimate, insistent and profound. Kalanithi had the mind of the
polymath and the ear of a poet."
*Daily Telegraph*
"Powerful and poignant… Elegantly written posthumous memoir… Should
be compulsory for anyone who intends to be a doctor… A profound
reflection on the meaning of life."
*Sunday Times*
"A stark, fascinating, well-written and heroic memoir."
*The Times*
"The power of this book lies in its eloquent insistence that we are
all confronting our mortality every day, whether we know it or not.
The real question we face, Kalanithi writes, is not how long, but
rather how, we will live – and the answer does not appear in any
medical textbook."
*Guardian*
"Exceptional."
*Evening Standard*
"When I came to the end of the last flawless paragraph of When
Breath Becomes Air, all I could do was turn to the first page and
read the whole thing again. Searingly intelligent, beautifully
written, and beyond brave, I haven't been so marked by a book in
years."
*Gabriel Weston, author of DIRECT RED*
"A tremendous book, crackling with life, animated by wonder and by
the question of how we should live. Paul Kalanithi lived and died
in the pursuit of excellence, and by this testimonial, he achieved
it."
*Gavin Francis, author of Adventures in Human Being*
"A remarkable book… Kalanithi writes very well, in a plain and
matter-of-fact way, without a trace of self-pity, and you are
immediately gripped and carried along… [He] was clearly a deeply
thoughtful and compassionate man, and his death is a great loss to
medicine, but at least he has left this remarkable book
behind."
*Observer*
"A meditation on what makes a life worth living."
*Guardian*
"It turns out not really to be about dying at all but about life
and how to live it — though the closeness of death gives it an
urgency and economy… When Breath Becomes Air is a Renaissance book
from a Renaissance man. It is a work of philosophy and morality, a
reconciliation of science and religion. There is even plot and
excitement… It was only with the restrained, elegant epilogue
written by his wife Lucy Kalanithi that I found myself weeping
helplessly… When Breath Becomes Air tells us what means to live a
good life, by giving us a glimpse into an exceptional one."
*Financial Times*
"A powerful and compelling read."
*The Economist, Book of the Year*
"An astonishingly affecting memoir and eloquent examination of what
it is to be human and confront your own mortality… This is a
remarkable book by a man who was driven by his passion for his
life, his loves and his career. His death is undoubtedly a tragedy
but in writing this memoir he has guaranteed that his voice and the
important story it tells will resonate for years to come."
*Daily Express*
"As thought-provoking as it was moving. The sheer exuberance of
Kalnithi’s intellectual curiosity shone through in his
writing."
*Evening Standard, Book of the Year*
"Dr Kalanithi describes, clearly and simply, and entirely without
self-pity, his journey from innocent medical student to
professionally detached and all-powerful neurosurgeon to helpless
patient, dying from cancer. He learns lessons about the reality of
illness and the doctor-patient relationship that most doctors only
learn in old age but Paul Kalanithi died at the tragically early
age of 37.
Every doctor should read this book – written by a member of our own
tribe, it helps us understand and overcome the barriers we all
erect between ourselves and our patients as soon as we are out of
medical school"
*Henry Marsh, author of Do No Harm*
"To the venerable canon of doctors who could write (from Chekhov to
Oliver Sacks and Atul Gawande), another name can be added: that of
Paul Kalanithi… Brilliantly written."
*Sunday Telegraph*
"Paul Kalanithi’s memoir, When Breath Becomes Air… split my head
open with its beauty. Truly. Madly. Deeply."
*Cheryl Strayed, author of WILD*
"Thanks to When Breath Becomes Air, those of us who never met Paul
Kalanithi will both mourn his death and benefit from his life. This
one of a handful of books I consider to be a universal donor - I
would recommend it to anyone, everyone."
*Ann Patchett, author of BEL CANTO*
"A remarkable book about what it means to live…a tour de force…The
book will be compared inevitably to Sacks’ work and also to the
iconic book that Joan Didion wrote about grief, The Year of Magical
Thinking. And like that book, it’s destined to become an elegiac
classic on the subject of mortality. But it’s a different feeling
from Didion’s gorgeous, melancholy fog of war. When Breath Becomes
Air is electrically alive in its anticipation of death."
*Elle*
"It is [his wife] Lucy who completes the book with an honesty and
elegance that echoes his own… This book goes a long way to
achieving what Kalanithi wanted to achieve – helping people
understand death and face their mortality. He emerges as a fine man
who faced his own with fortitude and integrity."
*Independent*
"Eloquent, elegant, heartbreaking memoir… As [Kalanithi]
courageously faces his death, he takes care to celebrate love and
hope in this sorrowful but ultimately life-affirming book."
*Sunday Express*
"It's a story so remarkable, so stunning, and so affecting that I
had to take dozens of breaks just to compose myself enough to get
through it…Although you know how this one ends, you still can't
believe it. That's because the author -- a nonsmoker whose cancer
was the result of a genetic mutation -- is so likeable, so
relatable, and so humble, that you become immersed in his world and
forget where it's all heading. It occurs to me, as I close this
book again (but not for the final time), that when I'm next on
rounds in the hospital, I will have something devastating and
spectacular to recommend."
*USA Today*
"[A]n emotional investment well work making: a moving and
thoughtful memoir of family, medicine and literature…His words are
bracing for their honesty. He also writes beautifully about the
philosophical aspect of medicine, neurosurgery in particular."
*Washington Post*
"It would be hard to conceive of a more tragic story… Kalanithi
provides a uniquely valuable perspective… [He] writes with
eloquence, humour and honesty from both sides of the medical fence.
His prose is fluid and precise, enlivened by brisk dialogue and
offbeat anecdotes, mixing a surgeon’s precision with a human touch…
Filled to the brim…with joy, humour and meaning."
*Literary Review*
"Devastating account of the shift from doctor to patient."
*Daily Express*
"A deeply thoughtful and beautifully written book on the question
of what makes life worth living."
*Macmillan Cancer Support*
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