Excerpt of The Diving Bell and The Butterfly by Jean-Dominique Bauby
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Prologue
Through the frayed curtain at my window, a wan glow announces the break of day. My heels
hurt, my head weighs a ton, and something like a giant invisible cocoon holds my whole
body prisoner. My room emerges slowly from the gloom. I linger over every item: photos of
loved ones, my children's drawings, posters, the little tin cyclist sent by a friend the
day before the Paris-Roubaix bike race, and the IV pole hanging over the bed where I have
been confined these past six months, like a hermit crab dug into his rock.
No need to wonder very long where I am, or to recall that the life I once knew was snuffed
out Friday, the eighth of December, last year.
Up until then I had never even heard of the brain stem. I've since learned that it is an
essential component of our internal computer, the inseparable link between the brain and
the spinal cord. That day I was brutally introduced to this vital piece of anatomy when a
cerebrovascular accident took my brain stem out of action. In the past, it was known as a
"massive stroke," and you simply died. But improved resuscitation techniques
have now prolonged and refined the agony. You survive, but you survive with what is so
aptly known as "locked-in syndrome." Paralyzed from head to toe, the patient,
his mind intact, is imprisoned inside his own body, unable to speak or move. In my case,
blinking my left eyelid is my only means of communication.
Of course, the party chiefly concerned is the last to hear the good news. I myself had
twenty days of deep coma and several weeks of grogginess and somnolence before I truly
appreciated the extent of the damage. I did not fully awake until the end of January. When
I finally surfaced, I was in Room 119 of the Naval Hospital at Berck-sur-Mer, on the
French Channel coast --- the same Room 119, infused now with the first light of day, from
which I write.
An ordinary day. At seven the chapel bells begin again to punctuate the passage of time,
quarter hour by quarter hour. After their night's respite, my congested bronchial tubes
once more begin their noisy rattle. My hands, lying curled on the yellow sheets, are
hurting, although I can't tell if they are burning hot or ice cold. To fight off
stiffness, I instinctively stretch, my arms and legs moving only a fraction of an inch. It
is often enough to bring relief to a painful limb.
My diving bell becomes less oppressive, and my mind takes flight like a butterfly. There
is so much to do. You can wander off in space or in time, set out for Tierra del Fuego or
for King Midas's court. You can visit the woman you love, slide down beside her and stroke
her still-sleeping face. You can build castles in Spain, steal the Golden Fleece, discover
Atlantis, realize your childhood dreams and adult ambitions.
Enough rambling. My main task now is to compose the first of these bedridden travel notes
so that I shall be ready when my publisher's emissary arrives to take my dictation, letter
by letter. In my head I churn over every sentence ten times, delete a word, add an
adjective, and learn my text by heart, paragraph by paragraph.
Seven-thirty. The duty nurse interrupts the flow of my thoughts. Following a
well-established ritual, she draws the curtain, checks tracheostomy and drip feed, and
turns on the TV so I can watch the news. Right now a cartoon celebrates the adventures of
the fastest frog in the West. And what if I asked to be changed into a frog? What then?
The Photo
The last time I saw my father, I shaved him. It was the week of my stroke. He was unwell,
so I had spent the night at his small apartment near the Tuileries gardens in Paris. In
the morning, after bringing him a cup of milky tea, I decided to rid him of his few days'
growth of beard. The scene has remained engraved in my memory.
Use of this excerpt from Diving Bell and the Butterfly by
Jean-Dominique Bauby may be made only for purposes of promoting the book, with no changes,
editing, or additions whatsoever, and must be accompanied by the following copyright
notice: Copyright© 1997 by Jean-Dominique Bauby. All rights reserved.
