Dr. Oliver Sacks is a practicing physician, professor of neurology and psychiatry, and the author of ten books, including The Mind’s Eye, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, and Awakenings, which inspired the Oscar-nominated film. His newest book, Hallucinations, is a provocative investigation into auditory, visual, tactile and olfactory misperceptions, their physiological sources, and their personal and cultural resonances. In addition to drug-inspired varieties, Sacks examines the many different types of non-psychotic hallucination caused by various illnesses or injuries, by intoxication—even, for many people, by falling sleep. From the elementary geometrical shapes that we see when we rub our eyes to the complex images of a visual migraine, hallucination takes many forms, and Sacks investigates the fundamental differences and similarities between them, what they say about the organization and structure of our brains, how they have influenced every culture’s folklore and art, and why the potential for hallucination is present in us all.
Please note new 7:30pm start time.