fat greasy belly, a rough coat caked with dried mud." His memory was so powerful that he could still recall decades-old events and experiences in perfect minute detail. After he discovered his own abilities, he performed as a mnemonist; but this created confusion in his mind. He went as far as writing things down on paper and burning it, so that he could see the words in cinders, in a desperate attempt to forget them. Some later mnemonists have speculated that this could have been a mentalist's technique for writing things down to later commit to long-term memory. Reportedly, in his late years, he realized that he could forget facts with just a conscious desire to remove them from his memory, although Luria did not test this directly. In culture The film Away with Words by Christopher Doyle was largely inspired by Luria's descriptions of Shereshevsky's life. A BBC radio play The Memory Man by Robert Ferguson was based on Luria's book Mind of a Mnemonist. "The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling" by Ted Chiang mentions Solomon Shereshevsky's remarkable memory. See also Funes the Memorious, a short story by Jorge Luis Borges Ideasthesia Notes References Small book about a large memory Full text in Russian of Luria's book about Shereshevskii. A Little Book About a Big (Vast) Memory An amateur English translation from original Russian. Further reading . . 1886 births 1958 deaths Mnemonists Soviet journalists