I thought the cases in The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat were obviously as fictionalized as an episode of House: the condition described is real and based on an actual case, but the details were made up to make the story engaging. But I didn’t read it in 1985 when it was published. Did people back then take statements like “based on a true story” more seriously?
I read it long after it was published, and took it as less fictionalized than House; in that show the audience can expect events to take the occasional turn towards wild implausibility for the sake of drama. I expected MWMHWfaH to fudge personally identifying details, sure, but to hew as closely to medical reality as possible. The stories in the book aren’t dramas, he’s not trying to give his patients satisfying “character arcs” or inject moments of tension and uncertainty. I don’t care if the personal details are made up, but if the clinical details are wrong—as in the story of the twins generating prime numbers, mentioned in another comment—that seems like a real divergence from the truth. I had assumed, from reading the book, that this had literally happened, not that it was a cute story meant to illustrate the power of the human mind.
I thought the cases in The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat were obviously as fictionalized as an episode of House: the condition described is real and based on an actual case, but the details were made up to make the story engaging. But I didn’t read it in 1985 when it was published. Did people back then take statements like “based on a true story” more seriously?
I read it long after it was published, and took it as less fictionalized than House; in that show the audience can expect events to take the occasional turn towards wild implausibility for the sake of drama. I expected MWMHWfaH to fudge personally identifying details, sure, but to hew as closely to medical reality as possible. The stories in the book aren’t dramas, he’s not trying to give his patients satisfying “character arcs” or inject moments of tension and uncertainty. I don’t care if the personal details are made up, but if the clinical details are wrong—as in the story of the twins generating prime numbers, mentioned in another comment—that seems like a real divergence from the truth. I had assumed, from reading the book, that this had literally happened, not that it was a cute story meant to illustrate the power of the human mind.