--- title: Oliver Sacks Reveals He Has Terminal Cancer description: Oliver Sacks, one of the leading public intellectuals of the last half-century, says he has only months to live. canonical: https://time.com/3714968/oliver-sacks-terminal-cancer/ author: Noah Rayman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-02-19T17:10:23.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T04:32:51.744Z article:section: Health og:title: Oliver Sacks Reveals Terminal Cancer in New York Times Op-Ed og:description: "It is up to me now to choose how to live out the months that remain to me" og:url: https://time.com/3714968/oliver-sacks-terminal-cancer/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1a0db0ed34b9bc71/69877fff0b72e378c26ddc11/oliver-sacks.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3090 og:image:height: 1738 og:image:alt: The Music Has Power Awards Benefit og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Oliver Sacks Reveals Terminal Cancer in New York Times Op-Ed twitter:description: "It is up to me now to choose how to live out the months that remain to me" twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1a0db0ed34b9bc71/69877fff0b72e378c26ddc11/oliver-sacks.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Famed Scientist Oliver Sacks Reveals He Has Terminal Cancer in Soulful Op-Ed > Sponsored content. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's daily health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free daily newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators.  by [Noah Rayman](https://time.com/author/noah-rayman/)  ## Noah Rayman Feb 19, 2015 5:10 PM UTC  Dr. Oliver Sacks speaks at the Music Has Power Awards Benefit in the Allen Room at the Frederick P. Rose Hall, Home of Jazz at Lincoln Center on Nov. 6, 2006 in New York City. Dr. Oliver Sacks speaks at the Music Has Power Awards Benefit in the Allen Room at the Frederick P. Rose Hall, Home of Jazz at Lincoln Center on Nov. 6, 2006 in New York City. Brad Barket—Getty Images  by [Noah Rayman](https://time.com/author/noah-rayman/)  ## Noah Rayman Feb 19, 2015 5:10 PM UTC Oliver Sacks, one of the leading public intellectuals of the last half-century, says terminal cancer of the liver has left him [with only months to live](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/19/opinion/oliver-sacks-on-learning-he-has-terminal-cancer.html). Sacks, a neurologist and author of books like _Awakenings_ and _The Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat_, revealed his condition in an article about facing death that was published in the New York _Times_ on Thursday. “It is up to me now to choose how to live out the months that remain to me,” Sacks, 81, writes in the _Times_. “I have to live in the richest, deepest, most productive way I can.” He says he will shun politics and nightly news to focus instead on himself, his friends, and his work–an autobiography is set to come out in the spring, and he says he has “several” other books in the works. He writes: --- > “” --- Born in the U.K., Sacks has spent most of his career in the United States, where his prolific writing has blended science and literature to best-selling success. Outside of work, he’s been nearly as active. A one-time weightlifting champion with a stint riding with Hell’s Angel’s—[according to a 1995 profile in TIME](http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,982689-1,00.html)—he says he still swims a mile a day. The removal of a tumor in his eye left him blind in one eye nine years ago and led to his 2010 book ‘The Mind’s Eye’ t[hat deals in part with his experience with cancer and his inability to recognize faces](http://healthland.time.com/2010/10/27/mind-reading-an-interview-with-oliver-sacks/). But the tumor metastasized, and the author now says the cancer’s spread cannot be stopped. “I feel intensely alive, and I want and hope in the time that remains to deepen my friendships, to say farewell to those I love, to write more, to travel if I have the strength, to achieve new levels of understanding and insight,” he writes. _Read Oliver Sacks’s story in the_ [_New York Times_](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/19/opinion/oliver-sacks-on-learning-he-has-terminal-cancer.html)_._ _Read next:_ [_The Secret of Abraham Lincoln’s Success as a Writer?_](http://time.com/3714917/abraham-lincoln-writing-grammar/?xid=time%5Freadnext) [_Listen to the most important stories of the day._](http://time.com/newsletter/the-brief/?sl%5Fautoplay=true&xid=spl-fullbrief-article) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3714968/oliver-sacks-terminal-cancer/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3714968/oliver-sacks-terminal-cancer/"},"headline":"Famed Scientist Oliver Sacks Reveals He Has Terminal Cancer in Soulful Op-Ed","datePublished":"2015-02-19T17:10:23.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T04:32:51.744Z","description":"The neurologist and author writes in the New York Times that he feels \"intensely alive\" in the face of death","url":"https://time.com/3714968/oliver-sacks-terminal-cancer/","keywords":["Aging","celebrities","Cancer","Healthcare","Neuroscience"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1a0db0ed34b9bc71/69877fff0b72e378c26ddc11/oliver-sacks.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Noah Rayman","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/noah-rayman/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1a0db0ed34b9bc71/69877fff0b72e378c26ddc11/oliver-sacks.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"The Music Has Power Awards Benefit","caption":"The Music Has Power Awards Benefit","creditText":"Brad Barket—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/aging/","name":"Aging"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3714968/oliver-sacks-terminal-cancer/","name":"Famed Scientist Oliver Sacks Reveals He Has Terminal Cancer in Soulful Op-Ed"}}]}] ```