Osler's "a Way of Life" and Other Addresses: With Commentary and Annotations

Rating:
Summary: straight from the doctor's plume
Review: If you are a student of medicine (current, former, or hopeful), chances are that you will read at least one essay, address, or other writing of Sir William Osler. And, like all students past, you won't have a clue about what in the world the good doctor was saying. Dr. Osler was a peerless medical scholar, an erudite man of letters whose vast learning towered over that of his contemporaries and even moreso of the doctors of today. He was to medicine what Samuel Johnson was to lexicography. Unless you have degrees in philosophy, philology, literature, and classics (in addition to medicine), you will most likely be just as confused as you will be inspired by Dr. Osler's writing.

Thankfully, we have this new book from Duke University Press. With more annotations than a Harvard Law Review issue, this well-selected sample of Dr. Osler's most well-known papers and addresses presents an effective "translation" to satisfy all medical scholars who, though they seek to emulate Osler's compassion and skill, just can't understand all of his references. When I first read "Aequanimitas," I felt like an ignoramus. After reading it again in this present volume, I felt like an enlightened student eager to carry the Aesculapian staff into the new milennium (or something like that). I highly recommend this book to all medical students and physicians who seek a model of professional excellence in Dr. Osler, but who have heretofore scratched their heads when reading his papers. Revisit "A Way of Life." Read the footnotes. Then don your white coat, tend to your patients, and be proud of the great American medical tradition set forth by Dr. Osler so many years ago.