But What Comes After?
Published on 16. June 2011
256 pages
978-1-84901-892-0 (ISBN)
Description
Ruth Leon was married to Sheridan Morley - theatre critic, broadcaster and Britain's pre-eminent arts journalist. He'd suffered from bouts of depression all his life but suddenly, after a mild stroke, his usual treatments stopped working. He sat, crying, his chin pressed down into his chest, all day, every day. Ruth looked after him - sometimes gracefully and sympathetically, often angrily and tensely. Also an arts journalist, for two years she did her own freelance work as well as his. She no longer recognised her husband, but she could be him.
One day, a consultant in Oxford said he thought they'd been treating the wrong kind of depression; that the stroke had damaged the emotional centre of Sheridan's brain. He knew of a procedure that might help, but it had never before been performed in the UK. It was an outlandish, fantastical idea - an implant would be put in Sheridan's brain that would allow doctors to adjust his mood with an electronic remote control. They would be tampering with the very core of what made Sheridan Sheridan. On behalf of her long-absent husband, Ruth agreed.
Ruth Leon's account of this unique journey to the heart of what it is to be human is as honest and moving as it is fascinating and challenging.
One day, a consultant in Oxford said he thought they'd been treating the wrong kind of depression; that the stroke had damaged the emotional centre of Sheridan's brain. He knew of a procedure that might help, but it had never before been performed in the UK. It was an outlandish, fantastical idea - an implant would be put in Sheridan's brain that would allow doctors to adjust his mood with an electronic remote control. They would be tampering with the very core of what made Sheridan Sheridan. On behalf of her long-absent husband, Ruth agreed.
Ruth Leon's account of this unique journey to the heart of what it is to be human is as honest and moving as it is fascinating and challenging.
Reviews / Votes
...this book, honest, unflinching, absolutely unsentimental, will do for bipolar disorders what John Bayley's classic volumes on Iris Murdoch did for Alzheimer's disease.... this magnificent and moving book... -- Roger Lewis * Daily Mail * Eye-opening. * The Scotsman *More details
Edition
Digital original
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Little, Brown Book Group
Edition type
Digital original
File size
0,36 MB
ISBN-13
978-1-84901-892-0 (9781849018920)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Person
Ruth Leon has produced numerous Television programs (for the American PBS network and London Weekend Television), specials for Radio 2 and 3, and is a theatre critic for LBC. She is the editor of the Theatergoer Magazine and writes for The Times, Wall Street Journal, International Herald Tribune and the Evening Standard and is the author of Applause, a theatre guide to New York City. Together with her late husband Sheridan Morley, Leon wrote Century of Theatre and three illustrated biographies: Gene Kelly, Judy Garland, and Marilyn Monroe.
