interrupted only once, when he accepted an invitation to teach for a year at New York’s Fordham University, beginning in the fall of 1967. The experience was marked by perhaps the most painful experience of his life—a 17-hour operation for the removal of a benign brain tumor at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Centre, in December, 1967.

For months, perhaps years afterward, McLuhan suffered from extreme sensitivity to sounds and smells. Loud noises caused him agonies. In addition, he endured some memory loss, mostly temporary. On the whole, however, he recovered quickly from the operation and resumed his teaching and writing when he returned to the University of Toronto in 1968.