Looking beyond the obvious, scouring cell after cell in search of that elusive answer, Dr Siddhartha Mukherjee’s raison de etre can’t be put into mere words. Yet, he does it with heart and soul. The doctor, who won the Pulitzer prize for his 2010 book The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer recently released his latest book, The Gene: An Intimate History, which is a biography of the intriguing life encompassing gene told through the doctor’s own family history and the mental illnesses that plagued his ancestors (schizophrenia and bipolar disorder) and the angst therein. From its aftermath, and emotional upheavals comes this new prequel that tries to answer heredity predicaments, but brandishes it as an emotional catharsis of ordinary life. The book will also be adapted into a film later this year.
The physician, oncologist, haemotologist in his prolific writing has explained the disease of cancer succinctly, bearing science and history as witness. Now, with The Gene, Siddhartha goes on to explain the gene in the context of the future, and how discovering the art of reading and rewriting genes can be explained as an evolution of the human being, but with a shroud on the efficacy of gene research in day-to-day living. In the country for The Gene’s promotions and to meet his ailing father, the Indian-born student from Delhi’s St Columba’s School, who went on to Stanford University, Magdalen College in Oxford and then Harvard Medical College, hopes to create a better understanding of the scientific nature of the gene while microscopically looking into the ethical debates.
“I decided to write The Gene as a means to try and understand my own family history. It is a book for everyone, and about everyone. It’s a book about families, and the unnerving influence that genes have on our lives. We need to understand the vocabulary of genes because of extraordinary technologies invented recently that allow us to change the human genome. All of us need to understand how to talk about these technologies,” says the erudite Bengali doctor who has tried to address the eugenics issue too.
The gene: An intimate history by Siddhartha Mukherjee Rs 699, pp 592 Penguin Books
For a layman, explaining the master code of life is incomprehendable at best, and the scientist has aspired to explain mutations, and gene sequencing, “We are still in the early days of gene sequencing. There is so much still unknown to us. We can detect mutations quite easily but it’s harder to interpret what these mutations mean, and what effect they have on our fates and futures. Genes intersect with the environment, and chance to influence our forms, fates and futures,” explains Mukherjee, who in his Stanford days worked in Nobel Laureate Paul Berg’s laboratory, defining cellular genes that change the behaviours of cancer cells.
Dr Mukherjee reveals his most cherished achievement. “I think my most memorable achievement was the discovery of a stem cell that can create bone and cartilage. No one had found such a cell in the body before. It was rewarding in so many ways.” What makes the ordinary extraordinary is Siddhartha’s unrelenting need to discover and understand the complexities of cells, and their inherent nature, and how that fits into our genetic and situational frailties.
Currently, as assistant professor of medicine at Columbia University and staff physician at Columbia University Medical Center in New York City, the nature of his work has demanded the highest degree of perseverance. He started writing The Gene about six years ago, around 2011. So, was it difficult to go from doctor to author? “No, I think of writing as part of my practice as a doctor. I think of both parts of my life as integral,” explains the Padma Shri awardee.
About the 2011 Pulitzer Prize in general non-fiction and the Guardian First Book Award, he is self-effacing and humble. “Awards are wonderful only because they validate your work. But writers write even without awards. Ultimately, it’s the writing that counts.” A Rhodes Scholar, his father was a company executive and his mother a school teacher in Kolkata. Asked what the boy who won the highest award at Columba’s, the Sword of Honour, considers as his influencers and shapers, he says, “More than the places, it’s the people that shaped me. All these opportunities allowed me to meet exceptional peers and thinkers. My parents are in Delhi so I come back about twice a year to be with them. I love returning home, and I find India full of energy and verve.”
In a profession that has so few answers amidst millions of disquieting questions, the researcher has an uphill task at best, which makes Siddhartha’s quest all the more tough, but the scholar has learnt to keep it simple. “Honestly, I find it exhilarating. It is the unanswered questions that keep me going. Growing up in this big Bengali family, they encouraged inquisitiveness greatly which has made me the person I am today,” says the New Yorker who is married to artist Sarah Sze. He and Sarah have two daughters, Leela and Aria.
The Mukherjee household straddles both science and art. “We are both immersed in our work. I think respect is key. We respect each other’s time and work immensely,” says the doctor who has tried to imbibe his own ethics onto his little girls, albeit more casually, “I try to encourage them to explore the world.” He might be deep in his research, never far from his notes, but everyone needs a breather even if totally engrossed in one’s life’s work, and for Siddhartha, it is music that calms and gives him a breather. “Indian classical music has always been my great love,” he says.
Most people don’t know that the handsome doctor does his own editing too. “Interestingly, I write in small starts and bursts. Often, I’ll write about two to three paragraphs and then take a break. I also do all my own editing at first,” he reveals. What’s next for the thinker, we ask. “I’m still thinking about it but I am considering writing science-fiction. Or something even more out-of-the-box.”
