If you’ve got half an hour, you could do a lot worse than spending it listening to ABC Radio National’s All in the Mind interview with neuropsychologist Dr Paul Broks, author of Into the Silent Land (ISBN 1843540347).
Broks writes in a part philosophical, part hallucinatory style, focusing on patients whose understanding and experience of the self has been disturbed by brain injury.
It’s one of my favourite books on neuropsychology, and Broks touches on many of its themes in the interview.
Broks has also written the play On Ego (ISBN 184002609X), which was based on part of the book, but which I found a little luke warm when I saw it and seemed to lack the originality of his writing.
However, he notes in the interview that he’s currently writing another play with the Royal Shakespeare Company about a woman who has intense religious experiences and temporal lobe epilepsy (the two often co-occur), which sounds immensely promising.
Broks will also be appearing at three events at the Sydney Writer’s Festival (two of which are free) so wander along if you happen to be in Sydney on May 31st or June 2nd.
Link to AITM interview with Paul Broks.
Mind Hacks 