Inspiration
The story behind the novel, and the identity of the surgeon on whose life it is based, is mentioned in a 2007 article in the American Association of Neurosurgeons' journal AANS Neurosurgeon, "Inspirations and Epiphanies"
The theme of the book is based on a passage from the Gospel of Matthew (chapter 6:1-4):
"Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven.....That thine alms may be in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret himself shall reward thee openly."
The philosophy behind the book is also partly that of "pay it forward", the idea that good deeds received are not to be paid back to the doer of the deed, but to a needing person in the future.
Read more about this topic: Magnificent Obsession
Famous quotes containing the word inspiration:
“Shakespeare carries us to such a lofty strain of intelligent activity, as to suggest a wealth which beggars his own; and we then feel that the splendid works which he has created, and which in other hours we extol as a sort of self-existent poetry, take no stronger hold of real nature than the shadow of a passing traveller on the rock. The inspiration which uttered itself in Hamlet and Lear could utter things as good from day to day, for ever.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)