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    Born on a Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant
    Born on a Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant
    Born on a Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant
    Audiobook6 hours

    Born on a Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant

    Written by Daniel Tammet

    Narrated by Simon Vance

    3.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    One of the world's fifty living autistic savants is the first and only to tell his compelling and inspiring life story-and explain how his incredible mind works.

    Worldwide, there are fewer than fifty living savants, those autistic individuals who can perform miraculous mental calculations or artistic feats (think Dustin Hoffman's character in Rain Man). Until now, none of them has ever been capable of discussing his or her thought processes, much less undertake the writing of a book. Daniel Tammet is the first.

    From childhood, Tammet's problems were immediately apparent. He was shunned by his classmates and often resorted to rocking and humming quietly. Yet he could memorize almost anything, and his math and language skills were astonishing. By the time he entered high school, Daniel was diagnosed as autistic, and he began to discover his own superhuman abilities-calculating huge sums in his head in seconds, learning new languages in one week, and memorizing more than 22,000 digits of pi.

    With heart-melting simplicity and astonishing self-awareness, Born on a Blue Day tells Daniel's story-from his childhood frustrations to adult triumphs-while explaining how his mind works. He thinks in pictures. He sees numbers as complex shapes; thirty-seven, for example, is lumpy like porridge, while eighty-nine reminds him of falling snow. Today, Daniel has emerged as one of the world's most fascinating minds and inspiring stories. While his brain has amazed scientists for years, everyone will be moved by this remarkable man's life story.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTantor Media, Inc
    Release dateJan 9, 2007
    ISBN9781400174034
    Author

    Daniel Tammet

    Daniel Tammet is a writer, linguist, and educator. A 2007 poll of 4,000 Britons named him as one of the world's "100 living geniuses." His last book, the New York Times bestseller Born on a Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant, has been translated into 18 languages. He lives in Avignon, France.

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    Reviews for Born on a Blue Day

    3.5/5

    716 ratings55 reviews

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    • 4/5
      This was fascinating - Tammet describes his unique capacities, his unusual way of perceving the world around him, in a very accessible way. I come away from this in awe of how his mind works. As he writes, it's neat to see how what made him different and isolated growing up now serves as a bridge.
    • 4/5
      I listened to the audio book version of this work while driving to and from a dog show. It was pretty fascinating stuff, especially as we have recently had some experiences with autistic patrons at the library where I work. I would recommend the book to everyone in order to gain a better understanding of how an autistic person's mind works or doesn't work, as the case may be.
    • 4/5
      This should be required reading for everybody, especially with a new study (Feb. 2007) indicating that 1 in 150 children in the U.S. is autistic. Tammet, who describes himself as a high-functioning autistic, succeeds in conveying the struggles he has undergone, many of which involve trying to make 'normal' people understand him. An amazing book.
    • 4/5
      As the subtitle says this book is about a high-functioning person on the autism disorder spectrum. But what the title doesn't explicitly say is that the autistic person wrote the book himself. As such it is a fascinating look into how a person with autism thinks and feels.Daniel Tammet is British, born to working-class people as the eldest of nine children. He early on demonstrated his autistic tendencies, preferring to spend time alone in his room over playing with his siblings or other children. He also displayed an early fascination with numbers. He has synaesthesia which means that numbers and words have unique shapes, colours and textures when he thinks of them. This perhaps explains his incredible memory for numbers. He holds the world record for reciting the digits of pi, a total of 22,514 digits in 5 hours and 9 minutes. He is also incredibly adept at learning languages. He knows 10 languages and once learned Icelandic in a week. At the same time he has all the emotional difficulties of a person with autism and he frankly talks about them.Truly fascinating.
    • 5/5
      I like the harder sort of cognitive philosophy or research, generally speaking. Sometimes, though, you have to go for something that's more human and less theoretical, and look at the experiences of the people who are dealing with these syndromes we study, and if you're feeling that this is one of those times, then this is the right book for you. It's charming and interesting, at the same time.Tammet is a very high functioning Asperger's person, with synaesthesia and savant syndrome, and he lays out some of his thought patterns on those fronts for the reader, to get an idea of how he views the world. He discusses how he sees numbers as particular shapes with particular properties, and how he approaches language learning, and his abilities to deal with other people; even just about how he is in his own body. That's all very interesting, as well.But in a way, my favorite parts of the book are just how he got through life. The descriptions of how he dealt with growing up, with his family and schoolmates and such, was very interesting, and it surprised me how much I could relate to what he said. The passages about how he found living in a different country (in his case, Lithuania), and his thoughts about falling in love and the importance of relationships, were very moving, as well.The style is spare and simple, but compelling, and the story is really engrossing and inspiring. This may not be the best book I read this year, but it's probably my favorite non-fiction one. It's definitely worth a read, if you have the chance.
    • 4/5
      A really hopeful story.
    • 5/5
      This was an excellent book written by a man who is an autistic savant. I was very touched by his graciousness and humility. He recounts his childhood, a very difficult and painful time, and yet there is no bitterness. His trials growing up 'different' did not keep him from remaining grateful for his extraordinary gifts, and for the people around him who helped him along the way. I recommend this book to anyone, but especially those who are on the spectrum, as they say, and their family/friends.
    • 3/5
      Interesting foray into the workings of the mind of a savant. The way Daniel sees numbers and math is so foreign to me--he is able to work much more complex problems in his mind than I can even on paper and with the help of calculators.
    • 5/5
      twenty-something British man with Asperger's autism and a savant (gifted with numbers) recounts his life and how he "sees" numbers as colors and patterns
    • 2/5
      I have to say I did not like this book very much. I had anticipated that I would enjoy it and it would give me some insight into the workings of a mind quite different from the norm, but I am as confused as I ever was about high functioning autism and savant syndrome. I recently became reconnected to a cousin who was several years younger than myself, who as a child I perceived as "kind of weird", but he recently told me he was autistic, but I came to realize he has special gifts when I came into possession of about 1,000 family photos that had been in his mother's house and he was able to identify everyone in the photos, and knew birth and death dates for many of our distant relatives, and even knew the burial places of many. So with that in mind I read this book cover to cover and ended up thinking that all the people in the author's life, especially his parents, had to have been saints to put up with what they did, starting with the author as a baby crying endlessly, continuing through his childhood acting so self absorbed with everyone catering to his every whim. His explanation of seeing words as colors and textures made no sense at all to me. The word "ladder" is blue and shiny, the word "jersey" is yellow, Tuesdays are a warm color, Thursdays are fuzzy. Huh? To me it made as much sense as someone telling me they are looking at a piano but seeing a toaster. I mean no disrespect to anyone dealing with this disease, but his explanations did not help me to understand how he can learn languages so quickly or memorize 22,000 digits of pi.I found it disturbing when his mother took him for a play day with a little girl, and because she interrupted him several times, he hit her and nobody did anything other than to remove him from the situation. He seemed too old at that point to have so little control. As he got even older, he was annoyed with everything it seemed. People drop by and interrupt his rigid schedule, he doesn't like that. People invading his personal space, he doesn't like that. Loud sounds, crowds, conversations about something he is not interested in, and on and on.The one area I was impressed with was his courage traveling so far on his own to Lithuania, despite having to leave his home and parents.I really hate to be negative about a book written by someone facing difficulties that I do not have, but I found it to be boring and not a good read at all
    • 1/5
      I couldn't finish this one. I kept trying to read it because it was a book club book, but I finally gave up when it was due at the library.
    • 1/5
      This seems to be a boring, poorly-written account of a very interesting person's life. I just don't buy many of the claims that are made.
    • 4/5
      I think it would be easy to rate this book lower than I did but doing so would show a complete lack of contextual thinking. Some may say that the book is written in a simple manner but the fact is Tammet is an autistic savant, the fact that he is able to write this well is impressive. It helps give us an insight into how the world appears to him and how his life has progressed. Many of the things he discusses (visualizing numbers, inability to emotionally connect etc.) are fascinating. This book isn't meant to be a science book or a critical self-examination but rather of a journey of understanding oneself and it succeeds in doing so.
    • 5/5
      I have a great-nephew who scores on the high end of the autistic spectrom. Although, as I expect all who fall into the autistic spectrum disorder category will say, his experience does not echo Daniel Tammet's, it was helpful to me to gain some understanding of what bright lights, sudden noises, and crowds can feel like. The book was a pleasant listen: Simon Vance does his typically good job.
    • 4/5
      Great insight into the autistic mind - words have colors, numbers have shapes, numbers and there intertwining that I think of as difficult to understand he forms into patterns. Reality is so different for us all.
    • 3/5
      Easy top read book. This is the story of Daniel who has a very high level of Aspergers he loves numbers and language. He can also hold conversations with people but does get nervous easily if his routine changes. Daniel is a genius.
    • 5/5
      This fascinating memoir by Daniel Tammet explores the world of a man who has Asperger's Syndrome, Savant Syndrome, and synesthesia. He is amazing! In 2003 he set a European record by reciting over 25,000 digits of pi, that infinite decimal number so useful in geometric and other applications. When asked why he did it, he responded:pi is for me an extremely beautiful and utterly unique thing. But the record attempt was done to benefit charity, used as a fundraiser by the National Society for Epilepsy in the UK.Tammet openly discusses the difficulties he's had with social interaction, with tolerating change, with different sounds and textures and in dealing with non-literal language. He also shares the joy he experiences in the unusual way he experiences the world, especially numbers. He attempts to describe the colorful landscapes he sees as he deals with numbers. His is a unique mind, not simply in how he experiences the world, but int hat he is able to describe it so clearly to those around him. He willingly subjects himself to scientific scrutiny.Sometimes people ask me if I mind being a guinea pig for the scientists. I have no problem with it because I know that I am helping them to understand the human brain better, which is something that will benefit everyone. It is also gratifying for me to learn more about myself, and the way in which my mind works.He comments how his difference from others, which separated him from others and caused him such distress when he was younger, has become something which has now allowed him to reach out to and interact with so many different people. It's very inspiring to see how he has learned to live a full, independent life despite the difficulties which his Asperger's syndrome presents.
    • 4/5
      This is a coming-of-age memoir about a high-functioning autistic savant who also has synesthesia. It is rare for a savant to be as high-functioning as Tammet, therefore this memoir provides a unique and fascinating look into Asperger's, savantism, and synesthesia. It was endearing to watch Tammet metamorphose from an awkward child into a much more secure adult. The story is insightful and inspiring...I imagine it would be especially so for teens with Asperger's who are concerned that they will never be able to function in the "real world."
    • 4/5
      In this very straightforward and easy to read memoir, Daniel Tammet describes how his mind works with synesthesia, his struggles during childhood, and how he has blossomed as an adult. Tammet earned fame in the past decade after he took on a challenge to memorize and recite pi to over 22,500 digits, and did so in a marathon session. He was also challenged to learn Icelandic within the span of a week, with only three days of immersion in the country. However, his early childhood memories are just as fascinating. He is the eldest in a large family, and never fit in at school, though he was oblivious to his social awkwardness for many years. He was too fixated on things of interest--textures, numbers, even ladybirds (ladybugs). At the end of the book, he acknowledges those same deep introversion traits that alienated him as a child have earned him tremendous acclaim as an adult.For me, this story felt very personal. My six-year-old son is autistic and some teachers have wondered if he is a savant because of his mathematical memory skills. He shares many traits with Tammet, including severe sensitivity to noise and obliviousness to things and people around him. Therefore, it was inspiring for me to read about Tammet and how far he has come in life. I'm not just speaking of the academic success; Tammet has a wonderful and supportive partner and manages a household. He has a fully-rounded and satisfying life. What more can any parent ask for?This is a book I'm keeping on the shelf for my son to read someday.
    • 4/5
      Fascinating autobiography of a man with autism and savant abilities: he memorised and recited pi to 22 500 places.
    • 4/5
      Bought this book after seeing a PBS (or Nat Geo, or Discovery, or something) special about him. What a great, inspiring story.
    • 4/5
      I heard about Daniel when I saw an episode of 20/20 thats how I came about to know his book, and I liked this book I gave it 4 stars I wanted to give it 3 and a half cause I was stuck between the ratings. I enjoyed reading all the accomplishments Daniel had made and will continue to make. I loved reading more on how Autistic Savants minds work, he has an amazing mind, and his book is a wonderful read.One other thing is I do not understand math a whole lot, I struggled a lot with it in school,and still do to this day, but some of what Daniel explained I understood it, I was happy to be able to learn and comprehend something I have struggled with my entire life with just a few simple sentences from a book. If you liked the movie "Rain Man" you should enjoy this book
    • 2/5
      Packed full of uninteresting information about the idiosyncrasies of his childhood. One particular part about how shutting off other parts of the brain can recreate savant behavior was compelling.
    • 4/5
      This is a very brave book. I’m not sure, had I been in Daniel Tammet’s place, if I would have willingly shared my life story with others. This young man, now fully independent and living with a partner in a loving relationship, grew up lonely and viewed as “odd” by others due to his having Asperger's, synaesthesia, and savant syndrome, the form of autism made known through the character played by Dustin Hoffman in the movie “Rain Man”. Blessed with parents and teachers who were fully supportive, he was able to actually turn his being “different” into an advantage. Eventually, he served a year for a volunteer service organization in Lithuania, succeeded in a contest in which he had to recite over 22,000 decimal places of pi, was a guest on the David Letterman Show, and authored a book.I applaud all of Tammet’s achievements, yet the best part of this book for me was how he explained his thoughts. Some of the math was a little over my head, but I was amazed to learn the “inner workings” of this man’s mind. My sincere hope is that, with books such as this, people take the time to read it, feel it, and thereafter develop more empathy to those who seem “different”. “Difference” does not necessarily equate with “lesser”.
    • 5/5
      Daniel Tammet has synaesthesia, savant syndrome and Asperger's. He has written a book about his life that is honest and provides great insight into the thoughts and feelings of people living with these conditions.I found the book fascinating. Daniel sees numbers as unique shapes and colours and he explains how this helps him to calculate and to remember sequences, such as the digits of pi. He also explained his feelings and how he interacts with people. It is a very honest book, written in the hope of helping others understand the conditions Daniel lives with. It is easy to read and engagingly written.
    • 4/5
      On an earlier visit she had brought a pile and in it was Daniel Tammet's Born on a Blue Day. It's an autobiography by a man who has two unusual genetic syndromes: (1) autism and (2) synesthesia. He has a highly functional form of autism called Asperger's with which I am somewhat familiar because one of my friends has that same syndrome. Asperger's manifests itself in a variety of ways, but most people who have it are highly intelligent and lack the ability to develop social skills from the same set of stimulus as others. In short, they tend to be smart and awkward. Synesthesia can mean the ability to see words as colored, numbers have personalities or shapes etc. Hence, born on a blue day does not mean a rainy day, but that Tammet experiences Wednesdays, the day on which he was born, as blue. It was entertaining and uplifting. I still get the sense that I don't entirely know him. It's not clear whether that's as a consequence of his syndromes keeping him from adequately expressing himself, my failure as a reader, or, that, in his late twenties, he simply isn't old enough to know himself. He is clearly highly creative and mathematical in the way that he experiences and interprets things. In some ways, he is able to describe the difficulties of his life as concepts and experiences, but not as feelings. I found myself filling in the gaps in emotion with my own. He verges on poetic at times--mostly, as he describes his experiences of synesthesia--and has written an inspiring tale. Being entirely unfamiliar with autobiographies, I can draw no comparison. If you like reading about the human mind, I would recommend it.
    • 4/5
      This is a very interesting and inspirational book. Daniel Tammet is an autistic savant who has written his unusual life story, and in doing so has provided the world with insight into what it is like to be an autistic mathematical savant. His mind works in a mysterious way, seeing numbers and letters as shapes, colors, and textures. He has the ability to do complex calculations in his head, speaks 10 languages, including Icelandic, which he learned in a week's time, and memorized the value of pi to over 22,000 decimal places. Daniel's savant abilities are amazing, but he is also autistic, and has had the social inadequacies that autism is known for. However, he faced these challenges and managed to overcome these idiosyncrasies and is living a full and rich life. I learned a lot from this book, recommend it highly, and chose it for my book club to read this month.
    • 4/5
      I early sought out this book via Bookmooch when I learned of it's existence. I enjoyed learning about and "meeting" Mr. Tammet during a television documentary. This book helped fill in more of the story. His amazing ability to articulate what is happening in his mind is thrilling to read. I am so glad he shared this with us. His story covers his experience both from a technical and personal perspective. His passion around numbers and language is palpable. Even for those of us who shiver and run away from anything math related.
    • 4/5
      If you've read "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time," one good way of describing "Born on a Blue Day" is as a non-fiction version of the former. The two are really similar in the way they try to explain autism, except that Tammet's is a true story. In fact, Tammet tells the whole thing in his own words: an autobiography, which, if I'm not mistaken, is pretty rare for autistic savants. (Daniel actually has Asperger's Syndrome, which is a high-functioninig form of autism.) I am tempted to give it a 4, which is my ranking for a pretty much all-around good, but not amazing, book, but it does read pretty slow in the beginning. The first 20 or so years of his life are rather uneventful, and his explanation of them repetitive. However, his description of his childhood does provide a window into a world that I wouldn't otherwise understand. The more recent parts of his life--his voluntary service in Lithuania, his memorization and recitation of 22,514 digits of the value of Pi, his relationship with Neil, and his trip to the States--really are incredible examples of how independent he's become. I ended the book feeling impressed with this man who is supposedly "disabled" and yet has had a more interesting, exciting life so far than most "normal" people have. Really makes you think twice about the inaccuracy of those labels.
    • 4/5
      This is a fascinating story of a young man who has learned to live effectively with Asperger's Syndrome, turning his personal challenge into a valuable source of information and income. Tammet is an amazing savant and he has developed a well articulated dedication to helping others with specific challenges. His book is touching, informative, interesting, and well documented.