ABSTRACT
From his first book, Migraine, to one of his last, Hallucinations, Oliver Sacks finessed the art of the "clinical tale". This chapter focuses on his work, which helps the readers to know about the relation between identity, memory, and trauma. In The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, people found stories to demonstrate the precariousness of personal identity. Critically, for the student of sociology, Sacks' work offered an unusual lens for viewing how one's capacity to sustain a stable sense of self can be disrupted. His attention to the idiosyncratic details, and the care he took in presenting them, doubtless accounts for his ongoing appeal as a writer and his success as a physician. Sigmund Freud, the writer of case histories, provides a clear precedent for Sacks. The chapter finally focuses on the line of discussion to write a case history.
