It is remarkable what latent powers of reminiscence and narration are
awakened by certain species of illness. In my case these ran chiefly
along the lines of ancient history; and during the weeks of lucid or
semi-lucid intervals I nearly wore out both my night and day nurses
with Greek tragedies and Greek and Roman history and mythology. I
recited the action and described the mythical gods and heroes in no
less than a dozen Greek dramas, and at various times I discoursed at
length upon the satiric comedies of Aristophanes, the tragedies of
Euripides, the naval exploits of the great Themistocles, the eloquence
of Demosthenes, the philosophy of Socrates, and the superb sculpture
of Praxiteles. Then coming down five hundred years later to the days
of Roman grandeur, I quoted many long since forgotten passages from
Horace, Vergil and other poets and orators of the Golden Age. I
declaimed, almost word for word, a famous oration by Cicero (which I
had not read or heard since my school days, and of which I can now
recall scarcely a single line), and likewise while raving over the
epistolary attainments of Pliny the Younger I repeated the celebrated
letter he wrote to his friend Maximus on the subject of downfallen
Greece.
Although the nurses and others who listened were dumfounded at such
harangues coming from an invalid, lying at times almost at the point
of death, they were not more astonished than I was, and still am, at
such abnormal volubility. The night nurse--a patient soul, who bore
the brunt of my hallucinations--afterwards told me she had been much
alarmed, because she had somewhere read that the lamp of genius often
flickers and throws out rays of unusual brilliance just before it
expires.
One morning, when I was well on the way to recovery, the head nurse
looked in at the door and asked me how the “baby philosopher” was
getting along.--“When you get well you must write a book.”
I said that was exactly what I intended doing the moment I got strong
enough to wield a pencil. By way of encouragement my day nurse--a
humorous, high-spirited Colleen--said it reminded her of an obscure
author she once had as a patient. During his illness he ranted
constantly about a wonderful story he had just conceived--one that
would make him both rich and famous; but a few days later he died
without revealing the plot to anyone but herself.
“Bring me a pad and pencil immediately,” I ordered. She did so, and
most of this narrative was written in bed during the following weeks of
convalescence.