Personal
Nissl was of small stature, with poor posture. He had a birthmark on his left face. He never married, and his life revolved entirely around his work.
One day, for a practical joke, Nissl (who was an active campaigner against human consumption of alcohol) placed a row of empty beer bottles outside his laboratory and made sure that Kraepelin heard that he could be found lying under his desk, dead drunk.
Nissl was a competent pianist. Hugo Spatz (1888–1969) told of his first meeting, when Spatz applied for a position in Nissl's laboratory. Nissl was busy that morning and asked the student to come to his home at twelve. When Spatz came to the house at noon, Nissl was not there, and the housekeeper finally opined that the Professor must have meant twelve midnight, so Spatz returned that night. Nissl was at home then, but Spatz had to wait in the anteroom for half an hour until Nissl had finished the piano sonata that he was playing. The conversation lasted until daybreak.
Read more about this topic: Franz Nissl
Famous quotes containing the word personal:
“The pursuit of Fashion is the attempt of the middle class to co-opt tragedy. In adopting the clothing, speech, and personal habits of those in straitened, dangerous, or pitiful circumstances, the middle class seeks to have what it feels to be the exigent and nonequivocal experiences had by those it emulates.”
—David Mamet (b. 1947)
“In the twentieth century one of the most personal relationships to have developed is that of the person and the state.... It’s become a fact of life that governments have become very intimate with people, most always to their detriment.”
—E.L. (Edgar Lawrence)
“Picture the prince, such as most of them are today: a man ignorant of the law, well-nigh an enemy to his people’s advantage, while intent on his personal convenience, a dedicated voluptuary, a hater of learning, freedom and truth, without a thought for the interests of his country, and measuring everything in terms of his own profit and desires.”
—Desiderius Erasmus (c. 1466–1536)