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The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is a memoir that tells us about the life of Jean-Dominique Bauby, a journalist. In the book, he talks about his life before and after a stroke that left him with locked-in syndrome. He died soon after the book was published. Summary of the Book Jean-Dominique Bauby suffered a massive stroke on December 8th, 1995. Ever since, his life changed drastically as he was almost fully paralysed. He decided to tell his story in a memoir and shared his life experience with the world. The book gives details of Bauby’s life after the stroke and tells us quite a bit about his life before the stroke. The book took ten months to write with Bauby blinking only his left eye. It was a process in which a transcriber would keep reciting the French language frequency-ordered alphabet and waited for Bauby to blink when he wanted to choose the next letter. About Jean-Dominique Bauby Jean-Dominique Bauby was a French journalist, author and editor of the famous French fashion magazine, Elle. He suffered a massive stroke at the age of 43 and was diagnosed with locked-in syndrome when he woke up from his coma. He then decided to write the memoir The Diving Bell and the Butterfly to tell people about his life before and after the stroke.