The Berlin Ophthalmologist Bernhard Pollack

Based on original research, this monograph is the first to portray the fascinating life of Bernhard Pollack (1865–1928), a pioneer neurohistologist, ophthalmologist, and world-class pianist. In doing so, it revives important scientists and musicians of fin-du-siècle Berlin. Pollack wrote the first standard reference on the staining methods for the nervous system (1897). Born into a Prussian-Jewish family, he received his piano education from Moritz Moszkowski and his pathology education from Carl Weigert. Pollack worked at the Institutes of W. Waldeyer (anatomy), E. Mendel (neuropsychiatry), Nobel laureate R. Koch (infectious diseases), and the Eye Clinic of P. Silex, before becoming Professor of Ophthalmology at Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität in 1919. English translations of two articles by Pollack, on musical memory and on Moszkowski, are included. The book also chronicles the founding by Pollack of the Berliner Ärzte-Orchester, who in 2011 celebrate their centennial.