Cutting for Stone

by Abraham Verghese

Few doctors will admit this, certainly not young ones, but subconsciously, in entering the profession, we must believe that ministering to others will heal our woundedness.

Operating Theater 3 for the first time, and an astonished

The Arabs had the dry, musty smell of a grain cellar; the Asians contributed the ginger and garlic; and from the whites came the odor of a milk-soaked bib.

As she bent over the child she realized that the tragedy of death had to do entirely with what was left unfulfilled.

“A man is only as rich as the number of children he fathers. After all, what else do we leave behind in this world, Doctor?”

Please lie down. Take off your shirt. Open your mouth. Take a deep breath … The language of love was the same as the language of medicine.

Without Genet as a witness, nothing I did was meaningful.

I BELIEVE IN BLACK HOLES. I believe that as the universe empties into nothingness, past and future will smack together in the last swirl around the drain.

There is a point when grief exceeds the human capacity to emote, and as a result one is strangely composed—she had reached that point.