The Quest of One Man
Whose Selflessness May Inspire Others
The story of the Harvard-trained physician and medical
anthropologist who co-founded Partners in Health, an international charitable organization
that provides health services to the sick and needy in Haiti and other countries,
was this year’s required summer reading for the incoming class of Smith’s
first-year students.
Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World, a recent
nonfiction book by local author Tracy Kidder, is written from Kidder’s first-person perspective
as he developed a friendship with Farmer and visited him over several years. The book gives an intimate
account of Farmer’s compassion and practical application of health service to people who cannot
afford it. In the rugged Central Plateau of Haiti, Farmer first began his service to the poor while still
a medical student, opening a hospital, Zanmi Lasante (Creole for “Partners in Health”), which
serves a population of more than 100,000.
“Paul Farmer is a remarkable person,” says Tom Riddell, associate dean of the college and
dean of the first-year class, who chaired the committee that chose the summer reading assignment, “and
Tracy Kidder is a top-notch nonfiction writer. We chose Mountains Beyond Mountains because it’s
a very compelling and well-told story about an understanding of the world and a commitment to combating
inequities and disease. It’s about global poverty, the science of health and treatment, responsibility,
dedication, organization and institutional and international politics.”
Before classes started, students met in small groups in residence living rooms to discuss Mountains Beyond
Mountains with staff and faculty members as part of orientation programming. Kidder, a Pulitzer Prize–winning
writer who has taught at Smith, joined Farmer on a visit to the college that evening to read from the
book and discuss Farmer’s work with audience members in John M. Greene Hall.
Kidder’s book joins past summer reading selections such as The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison; My
Year of Meats by 1980 Smith graduate Ruth Ozeki Lounsbury; The Gangster We Are All Looking For by Smith
faculty member Lê Thi Diem Thúy; and last year’s choice, Kettle Bottom, by Diane Gilliam
Fisher.
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