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When Breath Becomes Air: By Paul Kalanithi: A Summary
When Breath Becomes Air: by Paul Kalanithi; Foreword by Abraham Verghese A 15-Minute Summary & Analysis
Preview:
When Breath Becomes Air is the auto-biography of author, Paul Kalanithi and is the only book he has written. This summary will cover the important concepts in the best-selling book by the beloved writer. The book is written in two parts and each section will be condensed into a concise narrative so the reader can understand the gist of it quickly.
PLEASE NOTE: This is a Summary and Analysis of the book and NOT the original book.
This companion includes the following: - Book Review - Character List - Summary of the Chapters - Discussion Questions - Analysis of Themes & Symbols
This Analysis fills the gap, making you understand more while enhancing your reading experience.
Preview:
When Breath Becomes Air is the auto-biography of author, Paul Kalanithi and is the only book he has written. This summary will cover the important concepts in the best-selling book by the beloved writer. The book is written in two parts and each section will be condensed into a concise narrative so the reader can understand the gist of it quickly.
PLEASE NOTE: This is a Summary and Analysis of the book and NOT the original book.
This companion includes the following: - Book Review - Character List - Summary of the Chapters - Discussion Questions - Analysis of Themes & Symbols
This Analysis fills the gap, making you understand more while enhancing your reading experience.
28 pages, Paperback
Published February 14, 2016
14 people are currently reading
634 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 37 reviews
December 1, 2020
This book has three parts: life before his cancer, life during cancer, and the third part is written by his wife, Lucy after his death.
It’s not a simply question of whether to live or die but what kind of life is worth living.
What makes human life meaningful?
He loved literature, but neuroscience won out. Did he choose the right path for himself?
In his senior year in one of his last neuroscience classes they visited a home for people who had suffered severe brain injuries. He learned that many of the residents had nearly drowned as young children. As he looked around, he noticed there were no other visitors and when he asked about it, the guide explained that at first family visit constantly, then the number of visits taper off until it’s just birthdays and Christmas, and some families move as far away as they can get.
In a sense the child those parents had has died, who they were no longer exists. They are gone. Only their physical bodies remain and one must question, when is it not worth “saving a life”?
He chose neurosurgery as a specialty.
I was interested in learning more about the work of a neurosurgeon as my thirty-five-year-old daughter is currently going through brain cancer treatment after having a large tumour removed.
I know what it feels like to have the future no longer stand wide-open, but to be in question.
When you rush a patient to the OR where you can save only enough brain that the heart keeps beating but the person will never speak, and only eat through a tube. Is it better to live or die? What about the quality of life?
These questions he must also ask himself when he is diagnosed in his mid-thirties with lung cancer. As he comes into close contact with his own mortality, he must figure out what’s most important to him. And one of those things was the writing of this book. Though he never lived to see it.
Twenty-two months after his first diagnoses he died. It is sad. But it touches on what we all must face. We all will die. And maybe quality matters more than quantity. These are the things we often don’t want to think about: how long we have left to live.
I like the words of his wife at the end of the book: what happened to Paul was tragic, but he was not a tragedy. This was the life he was given, and this is what he made of it.
That is all any of us can do, make the best of the life we’re given.
I struggled with the rating of this book. I seldom give out 5 stars. I feel something has to go above and beyond to achieve the highest rating. I think this book is unique in many ways, and it helps the reader to question their own life and values.
It’s not a simply question of whether to live or die but what kind of life is worth living.
What makes human life meaningful?
He loved literature, but neuroscience won out. Did he choose the right path for himself?
In his senior year in one of his last neuroscience classes they visited a home for people who had suffered severe brain injuries. He learned that many of the residents had nearly drowned as young children. As he looked around, he noticed there were no other visitors and when he asked about it, the guide explained that at first family visit constantly, then the number of visits taper off until it’s just birthdays and Christmas, and some families move as far away as they can get.
In a sense the child those parents had has died, who they were no longer exists. They are gone. Only their physical bodies remain and one must question, when is it not worth “saving a life”?
He chose neurosurgery as a specialty.
I was interested in learning more about the work of a neurosurgeon as my thirty-five-year-old daughter is currently going through brain cancer treatment after having a large tumour removed.
I know what it feels like to have the future no longer stand wide-open, but to be in question.
When you rush a patient to the OR where you can save only enough brain that the heart keeps beating but the person will never speak, and only eat through a tube. Is it better to live or die? What about the quality of life?
These questions he must also ask himself when he is diagnosed in his mid-thirties with lung cancer. As he comes into close contact with his own mortality, he must figure out what’s most important to him. And one of those things was the writing of this book. Though he never lived to see it.
Twenty-two months after his first diagnoses he died. It is sad. But it touches on what we all must face. We all will die. And maybe quality matters more than quantity. These are the things we often don’t want to think about: how long we have left to live.
I like the words of his wife at the end of the book: what happened to Paul was tragic, but he was not a tragedy. This was the life he was given, and this is what he made of it.
That is all any of us can do, make the best of the life we’re given.
I struggled with the rating of this book. I seldom give out 5 stars. I feel something has to go above and beyond to achieve the highest rating. I think this book is unique in many ways, and it helps the reader to question their own life and values.
December 19, 2021
"I didn’t know. But if I did not know what I wanted, I had learned something, something not found in Hippocrates, Maimonides, or Osler: the physician’s duty is not to stave off death or return patients to their old lives, but to take into our arms a patient and family whose lives have disintegrated and work until they can stand back up and face, and make sense of, their own existence."
June 20, 2021
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. 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.
September 30, 2017
The book is about Paul Kalanithi who received a masters degree in literature and was planning on a PHD at Stanford but he had been obsessed with the question of "what makes life worth living in the face of death? His father had been a doctor. He wanted to know “where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” He set aside his plans for literature and writing and went to medical school. He wanted to have relationships with the suffering, and felt that he could learn more about what makes human life meaningful.
When Paul was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2013, he was a 36-year-old on the verge of making big contributions to the world with his mind and hands. He was a gifted doctor—a chief resident in neurosurgery at Stanford just months away from completing the most grueling training of any clinical field. He was also a brilliant scientist. His postdoctoral research on gene therapy won him his field’s highest research award. He could have written a good book on any subject he chose".
As he was ending his residency he learned that he had stage 4 cancer and that he might have 5 to 10 years to live. He could return to neurosurgery or he could write? He did both. He and his wife then chose to have a baby that came eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis.
He said of his pending death that is was unsettling (a big understatement) but he added; “Yet there is no other way to live.”
Both this book and "The Heart" (see last review) are about death. This one is nonfiction, the other is a novel. Both are very well written and both have the potential to change your thinking. The beauty and wonder of the body is really revealed in these writings. Paul wanted to find what makes human life meaningful and I think the answer is in both of these books.
When Paul was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2013, he was a 36-year-old on the verge of making big contributions to the world with his mind and hands. He was a gifted doctor—a chief resident in neurosurgery at Stanford just months away from completing the most grueling training of any clinical field. He was also a brilliant scientist. His postdoctoral research on gene therapy won him his field’s highest research award. He could have written a good book on any subject he chose".
As he was ending his residency he learned that he had stage 4 cancer and that he might have 5 to 10 years to live. He could return to neurosurgery or he could write? He did both. He and his wife then chose to have a baby that came eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis.
He said of his pending death that is was unsettling (a big understatement) but he added; “Yet there is no other way to live.”
Both this book and "The Heart" (see last review) are about death. This one is nonfiction, the other is a novel. Both are very well written and both have the potential to change your thinking. The beauty and wonder of the body is really revealed in these writings. Paul wanted to find what makes human life meaningful and I think the answer is in both of these books.
June 7, 2016
I do not often give a book 5 stars. This was excellent. Not only because I enjoy the subject matter, involving medicine as well as philosophy, but also because the author deals with those topics so exquisitely. Incredible writer. I was highly impressed by this book.
August 29, 2016
What a beautiful book about the journeys that life sends our way. Paul's ability to describe things is such a joy to read. Inspiring story of the path of life to death.
June 8, 2017
A good read but sad, even though the reader is aware that Paul has died you find yourself caught up in the story and hoping he will survive
January 10, 2026
This autobiographical memoir of Paul Kalanithi, a well established neurosurgeon, having highly sincere fondness for literature, metaphysics, arts andwriting , battling with lung cancer in his mid 30s and yet having the character to put down his life and his learnings in the form of this book.
Giving example of Keats and T.s. Eliot author shows his love for knowing about the complicacies of life.
I read very small amount of autobiographical novels , but this is one of the best because this is about individual's life who saves life and had to deal with cancer give us lesson that life is ironic and also gives us lesson what they have experienced in their life, moment of courage, love for family, time with them, living one day at a time, giving what they learn from universe.
From being a doctor and treating other patients to himself being a patient and being aware that not much time is left in his life , while dealing with cancer he still have love for his profession and he came down to do surgery for many patients shows us what a character of person he would have been all in the face of death. It didn't bother him till he decided that he won't be able to do justice with his work anymore he done his work and inform about it.
Giving example of Keats and T.s. Eliot author shows his love for knowing about the complicacies of life.
I read very small amount of autobiographical novels , but this is one of the best because this is about individual's life who saves life and had to deal with cancer give us lesson that life is ironic and also gives us lesson what they have experienced in their life, moment of courage, love for family, time with them, living one day at a time, giving what they learn from universe.
From being a doctor and treating other patients to himself being a patient and being aware that not much time is left in his life , while dealing with cancer he still have love for his profession and he came down to do surgery for many patients shows us what a character of person he would have been all in the face of death. It didn't bother him till he decided that he won't be able to do justice with his work anymore he done his work and inform about it.
December 19, 2020
‘This is what Courage looks like.’ -Paul Kalanithi trained for 10 years to be a neurosurgeon after first studying literature. Not far from Professorship, he didn’t expect the hand he was dealt in his own life. This book is a window to his soul, a memoir of being doctor and patient facing treatment for the big C, but still seeking a meaningful life - and the joy of fatherhood. People like Paul are rare, remarkable human beings. This illuminating look in to his mind is rather special. ‘Big C’ most definitely stood for ‘courage’. I read it. I wept.
February 4, 2021
Wow, so much to think about. Theology, mortality, family, career paths, literature, love, medical science... Sad to have such an intimate view of a brilliant life cut so short, but inspirational too—life is short, don’t waste even one second.
I did find myself more than a little envious of his access to fantastic healthcare. Most people in the United States wouldn’t have had the length or quality of life he did after his terminal diagnosis.
I did find myself more than a little envious of his access to fantastic healthcare. Most people in the United States wouldn’t have had the length or quality of life he did after his terminal diagnosis.
January 17, 2022
This book was touching, deep and stirred many emotions in me. It brought up my memories of being an oncology nurse, memories of my dad’s diagnosis and journey to death and memories of losing many more loved ones to death. It made me reflect on how they handled it….but also how I reacted and handled it. I wish everyone’s journey to the end of their life is reflective and meaningful….and peaceful.
March 4, 2021
From someone who is not in the hospital industry the big medical words used went straight over my head. I was expecting a lot more with all the reviews that were given but didnt really get much from it until the very end when his wife spoke
August 24, 2021
I read this book and now I listened to it. The first time I gave it a four. Now, dealing with a family member having cancer again, I’m giving it a 5. Paul’s bravery and resilience is beautiful and heartbreaking.
October 23, 2020
Too sad. I couldn’t finish.
February 19, 2021
The way he faces is illness and time left on this earth makes you think. It puts things into perspective as to what matters most in ones life.
July 5, 2021
Inspirational, yet sad.
November 20, 2022
A compelling look at mortality from a neurosurgeon/writer who gains an intimate understanding of death and dying, first from the perspective of a physician, then that of a terminal cancer patient.
December 24, 2022
Absorbing.
October 2, 2023
Anyone who works in healthcare should read this, profoundly humbling
Want to read
November 19, 2023Recommended by Dawn as audiobook.
August 4, 2024
A lovely book, quick and easy to read. Insightful and evokes a range of emotions
November 29, 2024
A deeply moving memoir that examines mortality and meaning with eloquence and courage.
February 28, 2016
This adult medical/memoir/essay on life and death is a worthy read.
It's a genre finding more shelf-space in recent years, and I've read several, but this feels stronger and more intense and authentic than some others.
It's a genre finding more shelf-space in recent years, and I've read several, but this feels stronger and more intense and authentic than some others.
May 9, 2022
A very well-written and emotional package. This book has three parts: life before his cancer, life during cancer, and the third part is written by his wife, Lucy after his death. Paul's ability to describe things is such a joy to read. An inspiring story of the path of life to death.
January 14, 2024
Well written and fast reading. Not such a happy book but I couldn't put it down. Interesting to watch someone go through this and hear their thoughts. Appreciated his wife's final thoughts at the end.
May 7, 2016
This book reminded me of the movie, "My Life." Of course, the professional circumstances were different, but the emotional progression was the same.
May 28, 2016
What a great book!!
May 31, 2016
a memoire worth reading... it is tragic but his life was beautiful in the short time he had.
Now I have to read about 4 uplifting books to adjust my mood.
Now I have to read about 4 uplifting books to adjust my mood.
May 31, 2016
Brings up some emotions for sure. Some interesting wisdom.
September 28, 2016
Interesting, but not as much as I expected. I see why it was written, but would not recommend for people who are personally dealing with cancer in a family member. It might be disheartening.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 37 reviews