perfect neutrality, and they left behind neither traces of memory nor pangs of lust.
“The operation,” one of the scientists who studied him concluded, “rendered him asexual.”
There is no equivalent device to the dolorimeter to administer emotional as opposed to physical pain, but if there were, many of the people who studied Henry believed, he probably would have displayed a similar numbness. He was known for his outward placidity, for his equanimity, for the flatness of his demeanor. He tolerated whatever the scientists wanted to do to him without complaint. Patient H.M. was, above all else, patient. On the surface, at least, he rarely seemed troubled, even when confronted with troubling facts. After his parents had both died, for example, the scientists would often ask him about them to determine whether even such massive losses had made an imprint in his mind. In a characteristic exchange in 1986 two weeks before Henry’s sixtieth birthday, five years after his mother died, and almost two decades after the death of his father, Henry had the following exchange with an MIT researcher:
R ESEARCHER: Where do you live now?
H . M .: In East Hartford.
R ESEARCHER: What sort of place do you live in?
H . M .: Well, I think of a house. A private house. But I can’t think of the name of the street.
R ESEARCHER: Who lives with you there?
H . M .: Well, right off I think of my mother.
R ESEARCHER: Your mother?
H . M .: I’m not sure about Daddy.
R ESEARCHER: You’re not sure about your father?
H . M .: I know he was sick. And. But. I’m wondering if he has passed away?
R ESEARCHER: I think he has passed away.
H . M .: Because he was sick before that and he was down to…He had to go to a hospital down in Niantic. Not Niantic. Uh. Mystic.
R ESEARCHER: Mystic? He went to a hospital there?
H . M .: He went, well, uh. Like, TB.
R ESEARCHER: That’s not very nice, is it?
H . M .: No, because he was down there for, well, quite a spell.
R ESEARCHER: But you don’t know if he passed away?
H . M .: No.
R ESEARCHER: I think he did.
H . M .: Gustave.
R ESEARCHER: Hmm?
H . M .: His first name. Gustave.
R ESEARCHER: That’s your father’s first name?
H . M .: Yeah.
R ESEARCHER: I thought his name was Henry.
H . M .: No. It was Gustave Henry.
R ESEARCHER: Oh, I see, what’s your second name? Do you have a second name?
H . M .: Yeah, Gustave.
R ESEARCHER: Your name’s Henry Gustave. Ah. That’s easy to remember!
Throughout the exchange, Henry’s tone never changed. He spoke in the same soft, gentle, halting voice that he used when discussing almost anything and never betrayed any obvious sadness when the scientist confirmed to him, for both the thousandth and the first time, that his father was dead. One day during another similar session, Henry carefully wrote a note to himself on a scrap of paper that he began carrying with him in his shirt pocket wherever he went.
“Father’s dead,” the note read. “Mother’s in a hospital, but she’s well.”
—
Arline Hallissey went to work, like her father, at the Hartford Police Department. She became one of the city’s first meter maids. She remembers walking her beat, looking at the parked cars, noting the baby seats or the coffee cups or the paperwork or whatever else was visible inside and trying to imagine who the cars’ owners were, what their lives were like, where they worked, how many children they had, their dreams and ambitions.
When I spoke with her she’d been retired a long time. She wasn’t in great health. She sounded frail. She told me she had small seizures sometimes. It was something the doctors hadn’t been able to pin down.
“I’m perfectly normal otherwise,” she said. “But you know what the brain does. It does what it damn pleases.”
—
Most of us have brains that work tirelessly, in dreams and in wakefulness, following their own mysterious routines. They absorb and process our experiences, they present and
“The operation,” one of the scientists who studied him concluded, “rendered him asexual.”
There is no equivalent device to the dolorimeter to administer emotional as opposed to physical pain, but if there were, many of the people who studied Henry believed, he probably would have displayed a similar numbness. He was known for his outward placidity, for his equanimity, for the flatness of his demeanor. He tolerated whatever the scientists wanted to do to him without complaint. Patient H.M. was, above all else, patient. On the surface, at least, he rarely seemed troubled, even when confronted with troubling facts. After his parents had both died, for example, the scientists would often ask him about them to determine whether even such massive losses had made an imprint in his mind. In a characteristic exchange in 1986 two weeks before Henry’s sixtieth birthday, five years after his mother died, and almost two decades after the death of his father, Henry had the following exchange with an MIT researcher:
R ESEARCHER: Where do you live now?
H . M .: In East Hartford.
R ESEARCHER: What sort of place do you live in?
H . M .: Well, I think of a house. A private house. But I can’t think of the name of the street.
R ESEARCHER: Who lives with you there?
H . M .: Well, right off I think of my mother.
R ESEARCHER: Your mother?
H . M .: I’m not sure about Daddy.
R ESEARCHER: You’re not sure about your father?
H . M .: I know he was sick. And. But. I’m wondering if he has passed away?
R ESEARCHER: I think he has passed away.
H . M .: Because he was sick before that and he was down to…He had to go to a hospital down in Niantic. Not Niantic. Uh. Mystic.
R ESEARCHER: Mystic? He went to a hospital there?
H . M .: He went, well, uh. Like, TB.
R ESEARCHER: That’s not very nice, is it?
H . M .: No, because he was down there for, well, quite a spell.
R ESEARCHER: But you don’t know if he passed away?
H . M .: No.
R ESEARCHER: I think he did.
H . M .: Gustave.
R ESEARCHER: Hmm?
H . M .: His first name. Gustave.
R ESEARCHER: That’s your father’s first name?
H . M .: Yeah.
R ESEARCHER: I thought his name was Henry.
H . M .: No. It was Gustave Henry.
R ESEARCHER: Oh, I see, what’s your second name? Do you have a second name?
H . M .: Yeah, Gustave.
R ESEARCHER: Your name’s Henry Gustave. Ah. That’s easy to remember!
Throughout the exchange, Henry’s tone never changed. He spoke in the same soft, gentle, halting voice that he used when discussing almost anything and never betrayed any obvious sadness when the scientist confirmed to him, for both the thousandth and the first time, that his father was dead. One day during another similar session, Henry carefully wrote a note to himself on a scrap of paper that he began carrying with him in his shirt pocket wherever he went.
“Father’s dead,” the note read. “Mother’s in a hospital, but she’s well.”
—
Arline Hallissey went to work, like her father, at the Hartford Police Department. She became one of the city’s first meter maids. She remembers walking her beat, looking at the parked cars, noting the baby seats or the coffee cups or the paperwork or whatever else was visible inside and trying to imagine who the cars’ owners were, what their lives were like, where they worked, how many children they had, their dreams and ambitions.
When I spoke with her she’d been retired a long time. She wasn’t in great health. She sounded frail. She told me she had small seizures sometimes. It was something the doctors hadn’t been able to pin down.
“I’m perfectly normal otherwise,” she said. “But you know what the brain does. It does what it damn pleases.”
—
Most of us have brains that work tirelessly, in dreams and in wakefulness, following their own mysterious routines. They absorb and process our experiences, they present and
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