When Breath Becomes Air: Pulitzer Prize Finalist
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • OVER TWO MILLION COPIES SOLD
This inspiring, exquisitely observed memoir finds hope and beauty in the face of insurmountable odds as an idealistic young neurosurgeon attempts to answer the question, What makes a life worth living?
“Unmissable . . . Finishing this book and then forgetting about it is simply not an option.”—Janet Maslin, The New York Times
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, People, NPR, The Washington Post, Slate, Harper’s Bazaar, Time Out New York, Publishers Weekly, BookPage
An Oprah Daily Best Nonfiction Book of the Past Two Decades • A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Book of the Century
At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi’s transformation from a naïve medical student “possessed,” as he wrote, “by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life” into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality.
What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir.
Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. “I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything,” he wrote. “Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: ‘I can’t go on. I’ll go on.’” When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both.
Finalist for the PEN Center USA Literary Award in Creative Nonfiction and the Books for a Better Life Award in Inspirational Memoir
This inspiring, exquisitely observed memoir finds hope and beauty in the face of insurmountable odds as an idealistic young neurosurgeon attempts to answer the question, What makes a life worth living?
“Unmissable . . . Finishing this book and then forgetting about it is simply not an option.”—Janet Maslin, The New York Times
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, People, NPR, The Washington Post, Slate, Harper’s Bazaar, Time Out New York, Publishers Weekly, BookPage
An Oprah Daily Best Nonfiction Book of the Past Two Decades • A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Book of the Century
At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi’s transformation from a naïve medical student “possessed,” as he wrote, “by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life” into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality.
What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir.
Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. “I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything,” he wrote. “Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: ‘I can’t go on. I’ll go on.’” When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both.
Finalist for the PEN Center USA Literary Award in Creative Nonfiction and the Books for a Better Life Award in Inspirational Memoir
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Community Reviews
I have never sobbed as I did at the end of this book. Sure, when Harry met Minnie choked me up throughout, and Charlotte "staying at the fair" was hard, but WBBA left me intermittently reading a line/a few, closing the book and sobbing, and trying again.
OhMyGod...it's hard to call it a beautiful story. It's hard not to. Maybe it's better saying parts of it are beautiful, while also gut-wrenching. The writing was amazing (to me). That the author was a doctor (granted, strong background and foundation as a reader/writer), I was impressed with the manner in which he composed his thoughts and conveyed them to an audience.
There was one part that REALLY burned my *rse. That m*th*r f*ck*r who pushed back on the meds the author requested. I really, really, REALLY dislike that guy.
I need to do more research, but without understanding why it was done - or in this case not, I do not like that the author's title is not listed alongside his name.
OhMyGod...it's hard to call it a beautiful story. It's hard not to. Maybe it's better saying parts of it are beautiful, while also gut-wrenching. The writing was amazing (to me). That the author was a doctor (granted, strong background and foundation as a reader/writer), I was impressed with the manner in which he composed his thoughts and conveyed them to an audience.
There was one part that REALLY burned my *rse. That m*th*r f*ck*r who pushed back on the meds the author requested. I really, really, REALLY dislike that guy.
I need to do more research, but without understanding why it was done - or in this case not, I do not like that the author's title is not listed alongside his name.
Absolutely beautiful writing. Something of profound value on every page, yet book reads so easily. I highly recommend this book to everyone.
What an amazing person Paul was, following his quest for meaning through literature, philosophy, medicine, and neuroscience, and ultimately through his reflections on his own life as it was ending. He achieved so much in his short life, bringing such skill and also humanity to his practice as a neurosurgery resident. It's hard not to mourn for the philosopher surgeon he would've continued to develop into.
I can't even imagine how much he must've struggled to get this book written, but I'm very glad he accomplished this one last amazing goal.
I can't even imagine how much he must've struggled to get this book written, but I'm very glad he accomplished this one last amazing goal.
The book really got me thinking and the epilogue tore me I knew he was gonna doe but still made me tear up when he did
the picture at the end surprised me btw
When Breath Becomes Air is a beautifully tragic yet analytical examination of human suffering and how it can reveal deeper truths about life’s purpose. Despite his immense success as a student and neurosurgery resident, Dr. Kalanithi was not without flaws. The clinical and, at times, detached tone he used to recount his life, diagnosis, and impending death reflected his internal struggle between his roles as doctor and patient. His journey was one of relinquishing control over his terminal illness while reclaiming agency over his core values and identity. Yet, in the end, he couldn’t help but write about his own sickness and experience as a patient in the voice of a clinical surgeon.
His words reflected those of a deeply academic man, someone whose life up until his diagnosis had been dedicated to long-term goals and the pursuit of intellectual growth, now grappling with mortality and forced to distill that lifelong ambition down to his daily intentions and presence.
His wife's epilogue made me cry so hard. So hard.
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