The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat Analysis

In the essay The Man who Mistook His Wife for a Hat we are introduced to Dr. P, who is a talented musician, artist, singer and music teacher. However Dr. P. is experiencing difficulty with his vision, or lack of it. Dr. P. finds himself in peculiar situations that put his abilities as a teacher and a functional, capable human being in question. Dr. P is having vision problems. He is talking to fire hydrants, recognizing his students only after they speak, and mistook his wife’s head for his hat. Is he having vision problems, or is it something even more serious? Throughout this essay Dr. P’s vision issues will be discussed and whether or not it affected his ability to function as a human.
Early on it I made clear the Dr. P is having issues with his vision. At first it seems as if it’s just a case of failing eyesight. As the story progresses Mr. P starts to affiliate people with their voices instead of their faces. For example “ Sometimes a student would present himself, and Dr. P would not recognize him; or, specifically, would not recognize his face. The moment the student spoke he would be recognized by his voice”(Sacks 8). As a teacher one relies on
P. is a talented music professor who is suffering from vision loss. He is finding himself in comical yet alarming situations because of it. He cannot identify his students by their faces, he addresses inanimate objects as people, yet seems to get along in a private world based upon functional memory and musical intuition. It can be concluded that the author’s thesis of the invaluable need for non- verbal, sensory cues and body language above aural communication was well supported in the essay. It can be seen how Dr. P. a brilliant individual is functioning much like a computer who seeks outstanding elements, marks, and features in order to assess his situation. There is no blame given to Dr. P. for his coping mechanism, however it is clear that Dr. P. has in a sense lost his humanity because of