Jean-Dominique Bauby

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Jean-Dominique Bauby (April, 1952 - March 11, 1997) was a French journalist and author and editor of the magazine ELLE. At the age of forty-three, on December 8, 1995, 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 by blinking when the correct letter was reached by a person slowly reciting the alphabet time and time again. Because of his paralysis, Bauby had to compose and edit the book entirely in his head, and convey it one letter at a time. The book was published on March 9, 1997, and Bauby died two days after.