Iain McGilchrist, a distinguished literary scholar and psychiatrist known for his works on the brain and culture, shares his fascinating educational journey. He discusses leaving a successful career in the humanities to enter medicine, emphasizing the integration of literature, philosophy, and neuroscience in his work. McGilchrist explores the significance of the right hemisphere in creativity, highlights the mind-body connection, and encourages a holistic educational vision that honors both the arts and sciences.
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question_answer ANECDOTE
Ted Hughes' Dream
Ted Hughes, while studying literature at Cambridge, had a dream about a fox.
The fox questioned his dissecting of literature, prompting Iain McGilchrist to reflect on the nature of literary analysis.
insights INSIGHT
Key Characteristics of Art
Works of art possess key characteristics: implicitness, individuality, and context dependence.
McGilchrist realized that traditional literary criticism often disregarded these, leading to a disembodied, reductive interpretation.
question_answer ANECDOTE
The Complexity of Samuel Johnson
Samuel Johnson, despite appearing staid, was unpredictable, demonstrating the complexity of individuals.
McGilchrist uses Johnson's example to illustrate how reducing individuals to categories fails to capture their true essence.
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Louis Sass's "Madness and Modernism" explores the surprising parallels between the experiences of individuals with schizophrenia and the themes and styles found in modern art and literature. Sass argues that many modernist works reflect a fragmented and distorted perception of reality, similar to the experiences of schizophrenic patients. The book examines the works of various artists and writers, demonstrating how their creative expressions mirror the altered states of consciousness associated with schizophrenia. Sass's work challenges traditional views of mental illness and art, suggesting a deeper connection between creativity and altered states of mind. The book is a significant contribution to the fields of psychology, art history, and literary criticism.
The master and his emissary
The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World
Iain McGilchrist
This book argues that the division of the brain into two hemispheres is essential to human existence, allowing for two incompatible versions of the world. The left hemisphere is detail-oriented, prefers mechanisms to living things, and is inclined to self-interest, while the right hemisphere has greater breadth, flexibility, and generosity. McGilchrist takes the reader on a journey through the history of Western culture, illustrating the tension between these two worlds as revealed in the thought and belief of thinkers and artists from ancient to modern times. He argues that the increasing dominance of the left hemisphere in today’s world has potentially disastrous consequences.
The Matter with Things
Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World
Iain Mcgilchrist
In 'The Matter with Things', Iain McGilchrist delves into the neuroscience, epistemology, and metaphysics of the brain's hemispheres and their impact on human perception and understanding. The book is divided into two volumes: 'The Ways to Truth' and 'What Then is True?'. McGilchrist argues that the left hemisphere's dominance has led to a skewed perception of the world, neglecting the vital role of the right hemisphere in integrating science, reason, intuition, and imagination. He explores topics such as attention, perception, judgement, and the nature of reality, including concepts like time, space, consciousness, and the sacred. The book is a call to re-enchant the world and ourselves by recognizing the deeper, more holistic understanding provided by the right hemisphere[1][3][4].
Awakenings
Oliver Sacks
Jonathan Davis
The book tells the extraordinary story of a group of patients who survived the great sleeping-sickness epidemic of the 1920s and were 'awakened' 40 years later by the administration of the drug L-DOPA. Dr. Sacks documents the miraculous and sometimes disastrous effects of this treatment, exploring themes of health, disease, suffering, care, and the human condition. The book also delves into the psychological and philosophical implications of these patients' experiences, highlighting the complexities of identity, personality, and the impact of their prolonged immobility on their lives[1][2][4].
The second part of a conversation between the renowned literary scholar and psychiatrist Dr Iain McGilchrist and Ralston College president Dr Stephen Blackwood about Dr McGilchrist’s remarkable educational trajectory.
In this episode, Dr Iain McGilchrist explains how he left his successful career as a literary scholar to pursue training as a psychiatrist and how his combined study of literature, philosophy, and neuroscience informed his later academic work, including his books The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World (Yale University Press, 2009) and The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World (Perspectiva, 2021).
The Ralston College Podcast 
