I first read Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony in high school. Thomas was a medical doctor, cancer researcher, and contributor of short essays about medicine and science to the New England Journal of Medicine and other publications. This included some of those, but also had other essays about nuclear war and the arts and humanities.
It is in some ways a period peace as during the mid 1980s Thomas was seriously worried about the prospect of nuclear annihilation at the hands of Ronald Raygun or the evil Soviet Empire that only lasted for about 5 years after this book was published. The title essay refers to Thomas no longer being able to listen to this symphony without imagining the end of life on earth. It seems quaint to have that belief now, but it was a real fear 25 years ago. Late Night Thoughts is a beautifully written book. Thomas' work is one of the reasons I enjoy the essay so much as a literary genre.
Czar
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