A Journey Round My Skull

By Frigyes Karinthy
Introduction by Oliver Sacks
Translated from the Hungarian by Vernon Duckworth Barker

The distinguished Hungarian author Frigyes Karinthy was sitting in a Budapest café, wondering whether to write a long-planned monograph on modern man or a new play, when he was disturbed by the roaring—so loud as to drown out all other noises—of a passing train. Soon it was gone, only to be succeeded by another. And another. Strange, Karinthy thought, it had been years since Budapest had streetcars. Only then did he realize he was suffering from an auditory hallucination of extraordinary intensity.

What in fact Karinthy was suffering from was a brain tumor, not cancerous but hardly benign, though it was only much later—after spells of giddiness, fainting fits, friends remarking that his handwriting had altered, and books going blank before his eyes—that he consulted a doctor and embarked on a series of examinations that would lead to brain surgery. Karinthy's description of his descent into illness and his observations of his symptoms, thoughts, and feelings, as well as of his friends' and doctors' varied responses to his predicament, are exact and engrossing and entirely free of self-pity. A Journey Round My Skull is not only an extraordinary piece of medical testimony, but a powerful work of literature—one that dances brilliantly on the edge of extinction.

Read the introduction (PDF)

Reviews

The first patient's-eye-view account of a brain operation in medical history. . . remarkable.
— Time

A remarkable subject, and the book is as remarkable as its subject. Not a touch of morbidity adheres to the story…indeed an extraordinary book.
— The Evening Standard

It would be impossible to read anything so moving, so frightening or so exciting…a terrible and marvelous book. It will be treasured by the courageous reader for its beauty, its poetry and its revelation of an experience that happily comes to few men.
— John O'London's Weekly

Pirandello could not have written it better…a triumph of writing, a very remarkable book.
— The New Statesman

Here is a book of surpassing interest and power…Written with utmost clarity and candor, Karinthy's account of his illness and operation is a compelling, unique achievement which needs no artifice…the patient's narrative holds the reader in a spell.
— Los Angeles Times

The London Evening Standard called A Journey Round My Skull…an extraordinary book. The New Statesman and Nation called it a very remarkable book. The Spectator an unusual and extremely interesting book. The Glasgow Herald a terrible and marvelous book. The British Medical Journal a book of the highest value. This chorus of praise is not too strong…A Journey Round My Skull is a document that few other men would have written and that no reader will easily forget.
— The New York Times

The first patient's-eye-view account of a brain operation in medical history…remarkable.
— Times Literary Supplement

Sign up for our free email newsletters for updates and special offers on NYRB books.