Close to the square where the most famous Portuguese poet, Luis de Camões, has a statue, Praça Luis Camões, next to the entrance to the metro, is the terrace of Café A Brasileira, a café that opened in 1905. Fernando Pessoa is sitting at a table on the terrace. He is being photographed incessantly by someone who sits down on the chair next to him, but he remains cool.
This time two films that are being screened again: the Japanese classic Ikiru by Akira Kurosawa about a terminally ill civil servant, and the rich but compelling Danish medical drama Open Hearts.
There are many famous doctors in our history. Some doctors have had diseases named after them. Think of Gilles de la Tourette, Cushing, Alzheimer, Parkinson, Dupuytren. Or doctors associated with a specific medical procedure, such as the Babinski reflex, or a particular symptom, such as Cullen or Trousseau. Oh yes, there are also doctors who have become famous as writers: Chekhov, Maugham, Lobo Antunes, Williams, to name but a few.
This edition features reviews of two feature films that both dramatize trauma and trauma processing in an original way: Drowning Dry and Hoard. We also look at the reissue (in Dutch) of Richard Flanagan’s award-winning novel The Narrow Road to the Deep North, about the fate of a doctor who was involved in the construction of the infamous Burma Railway under inhumane conditions during World War II.
The Salt Path was a – justified – bestseller, the film adaptation of the book is now proving to be a “hit” as well. In the book, Raynor Winn tells how she and her husband Moth – their college-age children are out of the house – lost all their possessions in 2013 due to a disastrous investment; they became destitute and homeless.
This section, edited by Henk Maassen, features reviews of current novels, films, music, theater, exhibitions and poetry in which medicine plays a role every two weeks on Saturdays. But, since we are a Dutch side in origin, films will probably be the main topic in the English version of Scoop. Comments, questions, tips, criticism, and …