Tag: Mahala Yates Stripling
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“Man’s greatest pleasure”: Dr. Richard Selzer, as patient
Mahala StriplingFort Worth, Texas, United States A Yale-New Haven surgeon-writer, Richard Selzer wrote stories about his patients that illuminated their souls. But he did not really know what it was like to be a patient until a dramatic, transformational event occurred on the last day of March, 1991. Returning home from a long speaking tour…
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“What’s a soul?”: Richard Selzer finds the spirit in the flesh
Mahala StriplingFort Worth, Texas, United States When he was a child, Dickie Selzer asked his father, “What’s a soul?” Julius replied, “No such thing.” When his inquisitive son pressed him further, he gave this answer: “Oh, a little bag of air, I suppose, like a breeze or a draft or a bit of a gale,…
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The surgeon storyteller
Mahala Yates StriplingFort Worth, Texas, United States Arriving early as usual, Richard Selzer leaned on his cane near the High Street entrance to the Sterling Memorial Library. Now at 5’ 7” and 123 pounds, this world-famous doctor-writer looked diminutive, dressed in his tan corduroy pants and checkered shirt. Several people crowded around to greet him,…
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Richard Selzer: The birth of literature and medicine
Mahala StriplingFort Worth, Texas, United States Richard Selzer was among the first physicians to understand the power of writing and reading fiction within medicine.He helped to open up this whole territory to those of us who came after. His legacy is, on the one hand, the text—what he’s written—and, on the other hand, what I…
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Richard Selzer’s last grand rounds at Yale
Mahala StriplingFort Worth, Texas, United States Richard Selzer was tired. He carried the weight of thirty-one years in the trenches, getting up by 5:30 to operate, then seeing patients on the ward, all the while being followed by medical students eager to learn his art of surgery. He loved his patients, but afternoon office consultations…