This article from American Scholar is one of the most haunting pieces of autobiographical writing I’ve ever read. Paul West, author of 50+ books and totally immersed in the world of words, had a stroke in 2003 that damaged the two main areas of the brain involved in producing and understanding language, Broca’s area and Wernicke’s area. He was left immediately after the stroke with a condition called global aphasia. It sounds like hell for anyone, and it’s hard to imagine a more nightmarish fate for one who lives for words.
However, through tremendous effort, he was able to recover enough language ability to resume writing; since the stroke, he’s produced a memoir, The Shadow Factory (find in a library), of which the American Scholar article is an excerpt, and a novel. His wife, Diane Ackerman, wrote an introduction to this piece that provides some context; the title I chose for this post comes from her brief essay.
It gives me the heebie-jeebies to think about losing the ability to use language. The very nature of the experience would seem to preclude reading a first-hand report of what it feels like to enter that state, which makes this essay extraordinary. I don’t know specifically the ways in which West’s years of writing shaped his brain and how he was able to somehow regain some of the territory he lost in the stroke, but it strikes me as a very moving example of neuroplasticity, determination, love, and courage.
