Marcel Proust photographed in 1905
Photo 12 / Alamy
The dawn serenely made his way over the city. The shadows, thrown in the way, slowly retreated to drink in a beautiful, bright morning. It was June, and several early climbs on the way to the creation of market kiosks were warmed up in a quiet, pale radiance of a new day, some little comfort, when the enemy was only fifty miles. Many who could afford have already fled from the metropolis, but most residents clung to the belief that the protective line would take place, as it was for almost four years. There was still hope.
On Haussmann Boulevard, several cars headed to the east, but otherwise the street was quiet, and most of its inhabitants still awakened. However, a resident of the apartment on the second floor at number 102 was for some time, in fact, all night. The shutters of his windows were tightly drawn, as for several months. His green lamp was the only source of light in the gloomy bedroom. Flapped with dark furniture with books accumulated on the table, and reckless pairs of Stimonium for his asthma, which covered the camera with sharp things, the room was the air of the oppressive imprisonment. Its walls with a traffic jam, especially the passenger for isolation from the sounds of the street and the rest of the building, added to the feeling of claustrophobia, which most of its visitors were supposed to feel.
Sitting in bed in his richly decorated Japanese domestic part and supporting two large pillows, at that time he usually worked feverishly on his manuscript, which he diligently wrote manually in black leather notes over the past twelve years. But this morning was different. He was covered by a stunning fear. One side of his face, he was sure, sank. When he talked with his housewife, Celeste, on the previous evening, he was convinced that his statements were slurred, his speech was in some way distorted. He must be on the verge of suffering from a large stroke, he concluded, just like his mother and father were amazed. There could be no other explanation. It was in family blood. And was his beloved mother, Jeanne, not with a terrible weakness? Her stroke deprived her of her tongue: she became an Afazika, unable to talk with her precious sons.
Thus, in the summer of 1918, when the Germans launched their last offices of the First World War in order to achieve Paris that the great novelist Marseille Proust sat in his blue satin sheets, considering fear from the brain disorder, which would deprive him of the most treated ability: to communicate. Now, for his late forties, he was very familiar with Afazia. Not only did his mother suffer from this, but in front of his stroke, his father Dr. Adrien Proust wrote a whole book on this subject.
The younger Marcel also got acquainted with many of the most experienced neurologists in the city. At that time, Paris was considered the leading center of brain diseases in the world, and some of its innovative experts made a significant contribution to this subject. They included the development of an understanding of language disorders after a stroke, which can worsen not only the ability to speak, but also read and write. Without these abilities, where would Proust?
This was the fear of his upcoming aphasia that morning in June 1918 that he made an appointment to see the famous neurologist Joseph Babinski, whose consulting cameras were only ten minutes on the number 170 on the same boulevard. As Proust recalled, Babinsky did not know about him. “Do you have a job?” Babinsky obviously asked.
The purpose of Proust that day was to force Babinsky to carry out a trepanation: to make a hole in his skull. His fear was so great that he was convinced that such a radical course of action was necessary to prevent the progression of stroke. Babinsky, when professional, examined Proust and assured him that there was no evidence that he suffered from a stroke and carefully refused to perform a surgical procedure. My God knows what could happen to the great romance of Proust, if he had. Marseille Proust never experienced a stroke, although the concern that one of them hit him continued to interrupt him until the end of his short life. Even when a few years later he was dying of pneumonia, it was Babinsky, who was called.
The fears of Proust about suffering from a state that affects the brain are not unique. Although any of us can develop the disease that affects our body, many of us are most afraid of – this is a disorder that affects our brain. Why? Because neurological conditions can make people become so different. Some may not be able to communicate, as Proust feared. Others may lose their memory or suffer from distorted ideas or hallucinations. Some can become socially inappropriate, not grabbing empathy or be rude and aggressive. Others can become very impulsive or disinfected, gambling in large amounts of money or develop new dependencies. Some may suffer from pathological apathy, abandon motivation for interaction with other people.
It is clear that changes in behavior or personality like this can be extremely frustrating and frightening people who develop them for their families. But they also talk a lot about you and me. Watching what happens when a specific function of the brain is lost, we can learn a lot about our usual Ihow cognitive functions contribute to the creation of who we are (our Personal personalities), as well as how they form our Social identity – Part of our Self, which comes from our relationship with others.
For someone like Marseille Proust, the loss of the tongue would be unpleasant. He will not only lose the ability to write, but perhaps it is also important that he will no longer have the same presence in his communication circle. The social identity that he worked so hard to the creation will effectively dissolve. Proust spent years, developing relations with some of the highest members of French society. He had excessive concern with his relations with people of influence. For a man who was gay and from Jewish origin (on the side of his mother), he deftly managed to make a huge success of navigation in terms of the difficulties of Parisian prejudice and snobbling.
Thanks to the observation and emulations, he became an insider in a world where few thought that he belonged or would have any influence. Indeed, some commentators came to the conclusion that Proust was a highly effective manipulator, a man who did not want to abandon his own influence in others in his orbit, even when he spent several days on Scripture in his gloomy bedroom. Without a language, however, the circles in which he worked so hard to be part will no longer be available. He will not “belong.”
This is an excerpt from Masud Hussein Our brain, our Self (CanonGate Books)winner Royal Society Triedi Science Book Prize And the last choice for the new book club of scientists. Register and read with us HereField
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