Video

Banquet speech

English I am a storyteller, so before I propose a toast I will tell you a story. Once upon a time, there was a boy who learned to read at the age of five. This changed his life. Owing to the adventure tales he read, he discovered a way to escape from…

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Prose

English Excerpt from The Storyteller (El Hablador) I FIRST became acquainted with the Amazon jungle halfway through 1958, thanks to my friend Rosita Corpancho. Her function at the University of San Marcos was vague; her power unlimited. She prowled among the professors without being one of them, and they all did whatever…

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Nobel Lecture

Nobel Lecture, 8 December 1981 Some Effects of Disconnecting the Cerebral Hemispheres Introduction: Classic View of Cerebral Dominance To start by looking back a little, recall that even a small brain lesion, if critically located in the left or language hemisphere, may selectively destroy a person’s ability to read, while at the same time sparing…

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Nobel Lecture

Lecture presentation Nobel Lecture NB. As Dr Sperry was disabled to give the lecture himself, it was read by Professor David Ottoson. Dr Sperry sat in the front row listening to the lecture and accepted the applause at the end.

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Prose

German Excerpts from Roman eines Schicksallosen (Fatelessness) (Seite 153 und 271-274) Die Hauptsache ist, sich nicht gehenzulassen: irgendwie wird es schon werden, denn es ist noch nie vorgekommen, daß es nicht irgendwie doch geworden wäre – wie mir Bandi Citrom beibrachte, der diese Weisheit seinerseits im Arbeitsdienst gelernt hatte. Das allerwichtigste ist unter…

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Nobel Lecture

English Heureka! I must begin with a confession, a strange confession perhaps, but a candid one. From the moment I stepped on the airplane to make the journey here and accept this year’s Nobel Prize in Literature, I have been feeling the steady, searching gaze of a dispassionate observer on my back.…

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