The Diving-Bell and the Butterfly

‘The most remarkable memoir of our time.’ Cynthia Ozick

‘Read this book and fall back in love with life.’ Edmund White

‘A staggering piece of work. It represents an almost inconceivable act of generosity, the gift of the mind and the spirit for which writing was designed.’ A. L. Kennedy

‘One of the great books of the century.’ Financial Times

‘Everyone in the country should own at least one copy.’ Guardian

‘We listen, because what he has to say goes to the core of what it means to be human.’ Robert McCrum, Observer

‘The most extraordinary book of the year.’ Daily Telegraph

At the age of forty-three, on 8 December 1995, Jean-Dominique Bauby, a well-known Parisian, suffered a massive stroke which rendered his brain stem inactive. When he woke up twenty days later, he found he was mute and almost entirely paralysed; he could only move his head a little, grunt and blink his left eyelid. This rare condition is called locked-in syndrome.

Despite his condition, he authored the book The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2002) by blinking when the correct letter was reached by a person slowly reciting the alphabet over and over again. Bauby died three days after the French publication of his book in 1997.