The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is a translation of the French memoir Le scaphandre et le papillon by journalist Jean-Dominique Bauby. It describes what his life is like after suffering a massive stroke that left him with a condition called Locked-In syndrome.

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The entire book was written by Bauby blinking his left eyelid. An amanuensis repeatedly recited a frequency-ordered alphabet, until Bauby blinked to choose the next letter. The book took about 200,000 blinks to write and each word took approximately two minutes. The book chronicles everyday events and what they are like for a person with locked-in syndrome. These events include playing at the beach with his family, getting a bath, and meeting visitors. The book was published in March, 1997. It received excellent reviews and sold 150,000 copies in the first week. Two days after the French version of the book was published, Bauby died.

Film adaptation

The book has been adapted as a feature film of the same name, directed by Julian Schnabel and starring Mathieu Amalric as Bauby.