"He explained how they reached tumors that were lodged deep in the brain, which is, very loosely speaking, crumpled up like a sheet of paper, and therefore full of folds and ravines that you can push aside and move through."
— Knausgaard, Karl Ove (b. 1968)
Date
December 30, 2015
Metaphor
"He explained how they reached tumors that were lodged deep in the brain, which is, very loosely speaking, crumpled up like a sheet of paper, and therefore full of folds and ravines that you can push aside and move through."
Metaphor in Context
The next morning we went on an excursion to the port of Durres and to Berat, a town in the mountains. Even though we had spent only three days together, it seemed as if we had known each other for years. Marsh explained the architecture of the brain to me, and the way it functioned. He explained how they reached tumors that were lodged deep in the brain, which is, very loosely speaking, crumpled up like a sheet of paper, and therefore full of folds and ravines that you can push aside and move through. There are also so-called silent areas, which could be cut without damaging any of the brain's functions. He told me about times when things had gone wrong, and the patient had died on the operating table in front of him. "I have killed people," he said.
(p. 41)
(p. 41)
Categories
Provenance
Reading
Citation
Reading print edition, text from online. See Karl Ove Knausgaard, "The Terrible Beauty of Brain Surgery," New York Times Magazine (January 3, 2016). <Link to NYTimes.com>
Date of Entry
01/05/2016
