In his new
book Dr. Andrew Lam says so many remarkable things about human eyesight that I believe
all writers and readers should put this on their must read bucket list. I, for
one, have read it twice. First, because it I found it so well-written and second
because as a writer my eyes are the primary tool of my existence.
Lam's
narrative covers the lives and inventions of doctors who have literally changed
the way we see -- but not without extreme difficulties.
It wasn't
their invention, generally, that troubled them. It was its reception.
I always thought
critical reception was hardest on visual artists and experimental writers.
Wrong. I didn't dream that doctors with ideas that run contrary to current
medical opinion had it much worse than Vincent Van Gogh or Mr. Poe.
Take the case
of Harold Ridley, knighted at the age of 93, after a total lifetime of
opposition in the medical field. The knighting came a bit late but at least it came along with the
other honors that he deserved for his groundbreaking surgical technique and his
invention of the intraocular lens.
Ridley's
discovery began with the injured eye of a WWII fighter pilot, who had bits of
plexiglas from a shattered airplane window lodged in his eye. What Ridley found
curious was that the human eye had made peace with the plexiglas. This led to
Ridley's invention of an artificial lens made of the same material. After this,
cataract surgery was not the same. It was, and is, quick and effective.
Dr. Lam has
written what I would like to call a "medical thriller" wherein we learn
just how hard it is to advance inventive science. As an extra bonus he cites his
own behind the mask experiences that are often edge of the seat mini-dramas. There is a world of wonder in this informative book about the men of science who would do almost anything to overcome the complacency of a tradition that accepts illness as a given.