Living with Asperger's

For a 10-year-old, Jake Hayes is very clear about what he wants to be when he grows up.

"I want to be a paleontologist for a museum," said Jake, whose room does not hide his fascination.


Shelves are covered with prehistoric creatures, mystical dragons and Godzilla, which Jake explains is a mutated reptile. Where there aren't creatures, there are books.

But Jake's not going to work in anybody's museum — he'll work in his own.

That Jake knows he wants to work for himself is just a tiny hint of his disorder. There were others when he was growing up that, when strung together, began to spell out Asperger's syndrome.

"Even when he was a baby, he would sit alone and play contently by himself," Colleen LaBorde, said of her son who was diagnosed with Asperger's at age 5. "He didn't have any marked developmental delays; his gross motor was a little delayed, but there was nothing that would set us off."

Asperger's syndrome is one of the autism spectrum disorders. Children with Asperger's typically have normal or above-normal IQs but struggle with social aspects of language and nonverbal communication, according to diagnostic criteria for the disorder.

The disorder is also marked by intense preoccupation around one or more patterns of interest.

That was evident very early on with Jake.

"When he was about 3, he memorized his favorite dinosaur book almost verbatim. He'd have sentences memorized before he knew what the words meant," LaBorde said. "If you asked him a question about a dinosaur, he could tell you these amazing facts."

In preschool, other characteristics became more pronounced.

"The teacher was worried because he would ask for the dinosaur book and go sit in a corner by himself," LaBorde said.

In kindergarten, the behavior got worse. Her son was ritualistic, protective of his toys and obsessive about certain things.

"He won't wear anything with a hole in it, not even a sock. I was at the school every day because of his behavior. He wouldn't sit still, and he'd poke himself and other students."

Every possible reason for his behavior — cerebral palsy, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, Tourette syndrome, among others — was offered up.

Nobody mentioned it might be autism until a Caddo school occupational therapist saw Jake.

"A therapist and my pediatrician thought the idea was absurd," LaBorde said. "I finally got a diagnosis from a pediatric neurologist."

She had to clear another hurdle when she began looking for resources.

"Nobody I went to knew enough about Asperger's to help. I was ready to leave the area to look for help when I found The Center for Therapy in Shreveport," said LaBorde. "That's made the biggest difference. It's really helped our family with so much more understanding (of the disorder.)"

Frustration has been turned into knowledge to help Jake work through the areas of life with which he has trouble. For example, he struggles with math, and his ability to focus can be a problem.

It's also difficult for Jake to understand what's appropriate behavior in social situations.

"You also have to be very literal when you talk to him," LaBorde said. "He doesn't understand sarcasm or little white lies."

She knows that with Jake's seemingly brilliant mind, he could have gone even longer without a diagnosis. That scares her, not only for her son, but for other families who might be seeking answers.

"If you catch it early, you can do a lot to help them improve their life," LaBorde said. "But there needs to be more trained professionals in the school system (who) can catch these children, because that's where it shows up."

Derek Paravicini The Musical Genius

Derek, now in his mid twenties, was born premature, at 25 weeks, and weighing just over half a kilogram. As a result of the oxygen therapy required to save his life, Derek lost his sight, and his development was affected too. It later became apparent that he had severe learning difficulties. However, he soon acquired a fascination for music and sound, and, by the age of four, had taught himself to play a large number of pieces on the piano, of some melodic and harmonic complexity (such as 'Smoke Gets in your Eyes'). Almost inevitably, with no visual models to guide him, his technique was chaotic, and even his elbows would frequently be pressed into service, as he strove to reach intervals beyond the span of his tiny hands!


At this time, his enormous potential was recognised by Adam Ockelford, then music teacher at Linden Lodge School for the Blind in London. In due course, weekly and then daily lessons were arranged, in an extensive programme of tuition that was to last for several years. Painstakingly (through physical demonstration and imitation) Derek acquired the foundations of technique that were necessary for him to move forward. His natural affinity for jazz, pop and light music soon became evident; together with his improvisatory talents, ability to play in any key, and flair for performing in public!


Derek's first major concert was at the Barbican Halls in London, when he was just 9 (in 1989). He played jazz with the Royal Philharmonic Pops Orchestra. Numerous national and regional television appearances followed, in the UK and overseas. His increasing maturity both as a person and performer enabled him to give concerts in venues across England and in Europe; among them, Ronnie Scott's renowned jazz club in London.


Today, Derek is a student at Redhill College in Surrey, England, run by the Royal National Institute of the Blind. He attends courses at 'SoundScape' - a unique performing arts centre for young adults with learning difficulties and exceptional musical abilities or needs. His talent, love of music, and - above all - the ability to communicate through sound means he will continue to thrill audiences for years to come in the UK and abroad.

Finding Your Inner Genius

Experiment Tries to Tap Brain's 'Savant' Qualities

Is this going to fry my brain?

That was one of the first questions I had for Dr. Allan Snyder when I visited his lab at the University of Sydney in Australia. I had gone there to participate in an experiment with mind-numbing potential. Literally.

Snyder peered over the circular lenses of his glasses and smiled. "In Australia we have very strong mental health guards before we're allowed to do this on anybody," he said. "And … I don't want to hurt you at all."

Tapping Into Genius-Like Abilities

In fact, I felt pretty safe knowing that Snyder himself and dozens of volunteers, including the famed neurologist Oliver Sacks, had gone through the same procedure — having magnetic pulses fired into targeted areas of their brains in an experiment designed to tap into the genius — like abilities that savants possess in art, music, and math.

The experiment actually inhibits some brain activity to afford — in its premise, at least — heightened access to the parts of our brains that collect raw information before the data is filtered into concepts.

"We have these severely brain-impaired people who are performing what seems ostensibly to be a miracle," Synder said, referring to the extraordinary powers displayed by savants who otherwise have difficulting coping with everyday life. "It must be something that's in us all, and we can't access. They can."

Amid the Gothic architecture of the University of Sydney in Australia, Snyder directs a place called The Centre for the Mind. Even in winter, the slightly-built American-born scientist begins each day with an Olympic-sized swim to get his own brain working, and he is a bit of an eccentric — some say a wizard.
But he has master's degrees from Harvard and M.I.T.; a Ph.D. from University College in London; is a winner of the prestigious Marconi International prize; and also has been named one of Australia's 10 most creative minds.

Before I underwent the experiment myself, I had some basic questions — especially, "How can a person heighten certain skills by by suppressing some brain activity instead of increasing it?" The simple answer to that is, our brains are always filtering information. Snyder wants to suppress that filtering process, so we can see things in a kind of raw state — as autistic savants do.

I've reported many stories where I witnessed the types of feats that Snyder is studying. In 1993, I met Kim Peek, a savant who was diagnosed as retarded, not autistic. Kim was one of the models for the savant that Dustin Hoffman played in the movie Rain Man. Despite an IQ measured at 69 and an inability to dress himself, he has read and remembered encyclopedic details and can execute astounding calculations in his head.

"Thursday," he replied instantly. "And this year it's Monday and you retire in 2010, likewise on a Monday."

Stephen Wiltshire, an autistic savant I met in 1991, became world famous for his books of architectural illustrations, even though he was walled off emotionally by his autism and had no conceptual appreciation of the buildings he could draw-accurately and beautifully — from memory.

"If I was born November 1, 1945, what day of the week was that?" a woman asked him in a group we were taping.

Savants' 'Hyper-Literal' Worldview

Here's the difference. We might appreciate a great architectural work as a masterpiece of human achievement, functioning, for example, as a center for art or commerce. To an autistic savant, Snyder says, the same building is essentially a collection of components and objects — raw data with no particular meaning.

"These are people who are hyper-literal," Snyder said. "They see the world, they see the shading, they see the details in this world that we bypass and we're never aware of. But of course, they pay often a heavy price for that. They don't have the concepts.

They don't have the meaning."

The question that Snyder studies is: can we unlock that same potential in our own brains without paying the price?

To conduct his experiments, he uses a technique called Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, or TMS.

"I'm using artificial means, in this case magnetic pulses to create virtual lesions — artificial brain damage — in a way that I can switch it on and off and have you display savant skills," Snyder said.

The "artifical" damage isn't permanent. Snyder's technique has been safely applied medically to treat depression and schizophrenia by using the pulses to temporarily suppress activity in some areas of the brain.

Hindered by Our Own ‘Expertise’

My brain, typically, has developed prejudices of which I'm not aware, Snyder told me as we entered the small room where he conducts his experiments.

"You're blinded by your expertise. You know, you do something. It's routine. You have a way of thinking about something, and yet you've forgotten why. In a sense, we're very prejudiced."
To illustrate his point, Snyder directed me to read lines that came across the screen like flash cards.

I thought I was reading the lines perfectly. After all, that's part of my training as a broadcast reporter. But I was completely unaware of the detail that I was omitting.

In a number of the sentences, Snyder added additional words. For instance, there were two "the's" in the card that read: "When in Rome do as the the Romans do."

I never even registered the second "the," or the additional words that were planted on the other flash cards. My mind identified a familiar concept — in this case, a cliché — and filtered out what didn't fit.

That's one way in which our brains process information.

"Our awareness seems to be that of an executive," Snyder said. "We get the executive statement, the executive summary. We don't get the back room deliberations."

A savant like Kim Peek may not have understood the meaning of the cliché, but he probably would not have missed the extra words I overlooked because of the literal way in which he absorbs information. Psychiatrist Daniel Christensen of Salt Lake City showed me that one possible reason for the manner in which Kim retains detail is that Kim's brain is lacking an important tissue bridge called the corpus callosum, which links the right and left hemispheres of the brain. One of the functions of the corpus callosum is to filter raw information. Kim, it is estimated, retains 95 per cent of the raw information he reads in one sitting.

Improving Our Ability to Look at Raw Data

With his experiment, Snyder wanted to improve my ability to look at the raw data. When Snyder's assistant marked a target with a pen on my blue skullcap, it was used to aim the magnetic pulses at the left fronto-temporal lobe of my brain, where (among many other things) I form concepts.

Would I be able to identify raw details more clearly — or reproduce the photos he showed me with more accurate drawings — when it was over?

Synder says about 40 percent of his volunteer subjects show pronounced effects. "They say they're much more aware of the details around the room. One person said that he had never before wanted to write, but suddenly he now wants to write compositions. In other words he was able to see the world in a kind of descriptive way."

I didn't become a da Vinci, but I did produce typical and interesting results. When I drew a dog before the experiment, I used the same techniques I learned in elementary school — assembling patterns of circles and ovals to represent the body and its parts.

After the pulses, I drew a dog in free-form style, imposing a better sense of motion on the figure. I started by drawing tufts on its back and tail — not the outline patterns I had been taught — but I was unaware until I looked at the videotapes that I had changed my method.
When Snyder published the results of his long-term experiments (in the Journal of Integrative Neuroscience), he reported that that was how many of the participants had responded. Compared to the "before" drawings, the "after" drawings — following 10, and then 15 minutes of pulses — showed stylistic changes that sometimes were radically different.

"I think this is the best indicator of how people break away from their mindset," Snyder said.

Skeptics say this could simply be the result of practice or repetition — even with savants.

Snyder cites case studies where sudden brain damage has resulted in unusual change.

"There's another person we've worked with who got hit on the head with a baseball when he was 9 years old," Snyder said. "He became very quickly … a calendar calculator." (He was instantly able to associate days of the week with specific calendar dates). "How can this be due to practice?"

Snyder also cites a landmark study by Bruce Miller, now of the University of California at San Francisco. Dr. Miller found that some patients began having extraordinary creative impulses even as some areas of their brains were deteriorating because of disease. The areas that showed damage in brain scans controlled language and behavior — where we label things. And as those areas were disabled, the creative side of the brain — including the frontal temporal lobes — gained more influence.

The condition is called frontotemporal dementia, and through Miller, I met one of its victims, Jack Friedman. As the damage to his brain progressed, Friedman changed from a conservative businessman to a free-spirited artist whose whimsical works sold for hundred of dollars each at California galleries. At the same time, his ability to function in everyday life declined drastically.
Freeing Artistic Talents?

Another journalist who participated in Snyder's experiment reported showing much more improvement than I did in his drawing skills. Describing his progress in drawing cats, New York Times reporter Lawrence Osborne wrote, "I could hardly recognize them as my own drawings?Somehow I had gone from an incompetent draftsman to a very impressive artist."

When asked what benefits may be possible from his studies, Snyder replied, "I don't want to be able to draw like a savant. But what I would like to do is see the world just for a moment the way it really is. I'd like to be able to switch off the mind sets, switch off the prejudices if you like … make new connections.

"Humans are very good at concepts. They're very bad at seeing the world in a new light. If I can switch off the part of your mind that has that mind set … and allow you to just momentarily to look at the world in a new light, then you might see a different way to connect the dots."

I was disappointed that I didn't even approach that type of creative enhancement, but the experiment did change the way I think about things. What you come away with is a lesson in perception — the idea that your brain can deceive you, or hide things from you, or make you see things as you expect to see them, not as they are.

Autistic Boy is a Human IPod

An autistic boy who is blind and can barely speak has earned the nickname the 'human iPod' because of his piano playing abilities.

Derek Paravicini began playing the piano when he was two and started performing at the age of four, demonstrating his extraordinary ability to hear, remember and play all the music he encounters.

"For Derek music isn't just a hobby, it's a lifeline - it's his way of communicating with the world, of interrelating with other people and above all of making them happy" - Adam Ockleford
His mentor is Adam Ockleford, who said: "Derek and I first met when he was little - he was about four and a half. He just broke away from his parents and pushed a little girl off the piano and played Don't Cry For Me Argentina."

Born three months premature and weighing just one and a half pounds. Derek grew up blind and severely autistic, but these disabilities have probably led to his musical gift.

"We think that because he can't see and doesn't understand a lot of what is going on, other parts of his brain have got used for making music - so he's got a sort of musical factory up there," Mr Ockleford said.

He continued: "For Derek music isn't just a hobby, it's a lifeline - it's his way of communicating with the world, of interrelating with other people and above all of making them happy. He likes to make people happy and he knows he can do that through his music."

Alonzo Clemons - Genius Among Us

Even as a child, Alonzo Clemons demonstrated the uncanny ability to mold clay into amazingly detailed animal figures he had never even seen. It was talent that only a genius could possess. But it was puzzling: Alonzo couldn't even feed himself or tie his shoes.

Doctors call people like Alonzo, savants. Savants can store information in their memories just as normal individuals do. But unlike most people, they can easily retrieve phenomenal amounts of information in a very narrow range. Savants can be exceptionally skilled in mechanics, mathematics, special relationships, or memorizing dates.

"He was always trying to sculpt things as a child. But I didn't realize what he was doing. Through it all he was just trying to sculpt." says Alonzo's mother, Evelyn Clemons.

Alonzo can see a fleeting image on a television screen of any animal, and in less than 20 minutes sculpt a perfect replica of that animal in three-dimensional accuracy. The wax animal is correct in each and every detail — every fiber and muscle.

"I recognized his talent since he was a crawlin' baby. But I was afraid he would never be accepted." Mrs. Clemons says.

But Alonzo, severely disabled as a small child, has been accepted for his artistic talent. His World Premier featured 30 of Alonzo's bronze sculptures, portraying the progression from a rough and primitive style to smooth and elegant fine art.

"In a relatively short period of time there has been phenomenal growth. It just doesn't happen that way," says Pam Driscol, owner of the Driscol Gallery in Aspen Colorado, who in large part is responsible for Alonzo's debut. Driscol has helped Alonzo manage his career since his Premier."

It's exceptional for an artist to make such a name for himself in just three short years after entering the art world. Normally it takes 10 to 12 years," Driscol says.

Perhaps his greatest work is a sculpture entitled "Three Frolicking Foals." The life-size sculpture took just three weeks for Alonzo to create.

"God takes, but God gives so much in return," says Mrs. Clemons of her son who lives in Boulder, Colorado. "It's been hard, but I'm so happy for him that he's been accepted for what he is — a great artist. And he's always happy to show what he can do. This pleases him very much."

Since his 1986 premiere exhibit. Alonzo continues to sculpt magnificently. His work is on display at the Driscol Galleries in Aspen, Colorado. Attached are some of his recent works.

Alonzo's moves toward independence are as impressive as his sculpture. Presently he lives in his own apartment in Boulder. He has a part time job in Boulder as well where you will see him always smiling as he carefully and cheerfully does his assigned housekeeping tasks. When not busied with those duties, he works out with weights and other equipment at the facility where he is employed. His mellow mood is continuous, and contagious. He fits into the community warmly as a truly valued member.

Alonzo continues to sculpt animals primarily, each done with the authenticity and grace that so characterize his work. His powerful hands mold the crystalline continuously. He can still complete a piece in 45 minutes to an hour or so. Recently Alonzo has been doing some drawing, and those drawings, like his sculptures, are impressive.

Alonzo is doing exceedingly well. His savant ability has been a conduit toward normalization. His vocabulary has expanded, he is more and more comfortable socially and now lives much more independently. It has been a marvelous transition.

The "Gifted Hands" of Alonzo Clemons

Alonzo Clemons now has a Web site. It is a collabortive effort between Gifted Hands, Inc., VSA Arts of Colorado and artsales.com. Gifted Hands, Inc. is now the official representative, and contact point, for information about Alonzo and his works.

Alonzo continues to live and work in Boulder, Colorado where he his a vital part of that community. He continues his part-time employment at the Y.M.C.A. and has shared his weight-lifting skills in the Special Olympics competition. His incredible sculpting ability continues and flourishes. His hope is to do some more life-size figures like the Three Frolicking Foals that is so lively and spirited. More information about this new dimension to Alonzo's life, and his increased visibility, can be seen at his Web site.

It was Alonzo's World Premier in Denver in 1986 that led to the establishment of a information and clearinghouse center for Savant Syndrome, through the Wisconsin Medical Society Foundation, and then eventually to the establishment and maintainance of this site.

What is Aspergers Syndrome ?Based on one Aspie's own point of view

Note: This article was written when this web site was entitled "Aspie Advocacy." When I realized that I am more properly HFA (high-functioning autistic) than aspie, despite my many similarities to aspies, I decided that a bifurcated view of AS and autism did not make sense. Thus, I changed the name of the site, as well as the editorial "slant," to reflect the unified nature of the spectrum as a whole. That is why I recently changed the title in the link to this article. However, for the moment, I am leaving the article as it was written originally. Keep in mind that when I say "aspie" in this article, I refer to all people on the higher-functioning end of the spectrum, regardless of which diagnosis they may have.

Asperger's syndrome is a form of autism. Autism, in all of its forms, is what is called a pervasive developmental disorder. In essence, it is a slight difference in the construction of the brain, probably present since birth, that affects the way the child develops. It's not a mental condition... it is a neurological difference. Although the terms that describe it (syndrome, disorder, et cetera) have onerous connotations, it's more accurate to simply say that so affected individuals are different.

Most of the differences relate to the way that aspies (a term that people with Asperger's Syndrome use to describe themselves) communicate with others. They tend to have a rather straightforward style, and that has several implications. First, the roundabout way in which normal (neurologically typical, or NT) people communicate is replaced with a rather blunt, sometimes apparently tactless approach. Aspies say what they are thinking, and there is no such thing as beating around the bush. They don't "say things without saying them," or lace their words with innuendo or hidden meaning. There's no subtext... what is said is what is meant, and it is that simple. NTs often have a hard time figuring out what an aspie means, simply because he (the NT) is not accustomed to interpreting the words completely at face value. They often refuse to believe that there is no hidden meaning, or that the comments they interpret as rude or harsh are actually meant to be helpful. This can cause hard feelings and misunderstandings, and unfortunately the aspie is usually on the losing end of the exchange.

Aspies communicate and interpret language literally. That's not to say that they do not make use of metaphor or simile; in fact, many of them show rather advanced use of such concepts. However, the basic mode is to use words in a very unambiguous and precise way. Precision and clarity (and often verbosity) are the hallmarks of typical aspie speech and prose. Aspies typically use a formal manner in everyday communications, written or spoken. While odd to NTs, this is an outgrowth of the aspie preoccupation with precision and accuracy in the use of language.

As children, aspies lack the inborn "detective skills" to automatically determine and integrate the "unwritten rules" of personal conduct and body language (often including facial expressions). Parents do not have to actively teach their children to recognize these nonverbal cues, because the children have a built-in ability to learn them, and to incorporate them appropriately into their own code of conduct. Aspies never pick up on these things, so as adults, they still do not have the ability to recognize these nonverbal signals. Of course, this can cause confusion when NTs and aspies communicate. The NT may send signals that he is not interested in a particular topic, or that he has tired of talking to the other person completely. The aspie will miss these signals, and the NT typically grows more and more angry as his signals, from his perspective (and at an unconscious level), are ignored.

The aspie, whether a child or an adult, is not usually interested in the social hierarchy of the group. Popularity, "coolness," jealousy, image, office politics... all of these are things that do not concern aspies. Unfortunately, this often means that they end up at the bottom of the hierarchy. In school, aspie kids are often picked on by all of the other kids, who seek to improve their own prestige by abusing others. That need to improve one's image, even if by making others look bad, is not something that aspies can really comprehend. They just do what they want to do, without any worry about whether something is "cool" or not.

Many of the medical texts suggest that people with AS prefer to be alone. That's not really accurate, though. While most aspies will need to have some "alone" time each day, they don't usually want to remain solitary all of the time. Most aspies do want to be social and to interact with others, but they often have long histories of disastrous results with regard to interpersonal communications, for the reasons described above. It is not so hard to see why many aspies shy away from others.

Aspies tend to be well above average in intelligence, and language skills far in excess of the norm for the age group are common. Aspie children often read and write several grade levels higher than their like-aged peers. Aspies of all ages often have unusually expansive working vocabularies, and it is often said that aspie kids talk like adults.

One of the most interesting aspects of the aspie personality is the "perseveration," or the special interest. Aspies tend to be rather deeply engrossed in one specific topic, and that one area of interest dominates the mind and free time. This is not to say that they cannot think of anything else, but they show a sense of zeal and enthusiasm for the special interest that most NTs will never experience. The topics of interest can be quite common, like computers or car repair, or they can be rather bizarre. Anything from dinosaurs to fleas to mimeograph machines can be the focus. The person will typically seek to gather and absorb as much information on the special interest as he can find... from libraries, the internet, experts in the field, and through direct experience where possible. Sometimes the special interest persists for years; in other cases, it may only last for a few weeks, at which time a new interest will take over.

Aspies tend to be very responsive to stimulus. Loud noises, bright lights, powerful odors, or unexpected touch can overload an aspie's mind. Loud noises of short duration produce an effect in the mind that resembles that of scratching a chalkboard. Certain persistent noises, especially loud or "busy" ones (like multiple voices), can be very tiring and stressful. Visually busy or bright environments can have a similar effect. Aspies tend to prefer quiet environments with subdued lighting. Many of them carry earplugs and sunglasses to help them deal with unexpected sensory overloads.

The aspie mind by nature abhors inaccuracy and imprecision, and dishonesty and deception do not come naturally. Aspies are by nature loyal, accepting of difference, and have a talent for being able to accurately assess themselves and others. Their unique position outside of the norm allows them to see things as few can.

By nature, people with AS are innovators; their inability to recognize the unwritten rules means that they live in a world largely without preset limits... so ideas and concepts that may never have existed without such a perspective are born. People like Ludwig von Beethoven, Thomas Jefferson, Albert Einstein, and Bill Gates were (or are) probably aspies. Arrogant, eccentric, strange, intelligent, perceptive, genius. They're all words that have been used to describe the people above, as well as many or most known aspies.

Medical texts tend to describe AS in terms of impairment, disability, and the problems it causes. They're all written from the perspective that normal is good and unusual is bad; that all deviations from the usual are signs of dysfunction and must eventually be cured. They fail to see the beauty of AS, and of being different. Many aspies, including the author of this article, like their AS... it is more than just a condition in a medical book. It's a part of who they are, and what thy are. As this article's author says, "I would not be 'me' if the AS were not there. I really do see it as a thing of beauty."

Beyond the Wall:Stephen Shore

Personal Experiences with Autism and Asperger Syndrome

By Stephen M. Shore

Autism Asperger Publishing Company, 2001, 174 pages. $19.95

There is certainly no shortage of books about autism, and there is also a rapidly growing collection of titles about Asperger Syndrome. When a child receives a diagnosis in the Autism Spectrum, parents search for the key to unlock the puzzle of this mysterious and baffling condition, and it's hard to know where to start reading. Occasionally there is a special contribution such as Beyond the Wall: Personal Experiences with Autism and Asperger Syndrome by Stephen Shore. As an individual who grew up with autism, Shore has an exceptional input to give.

Of course, every parent whose child lives within the autistic spectrum would yearn for their son or daughter to turn out like Stephen Shore or Temple Grandin. I myself am no exception to this rule. For that reason, as the father of a 22 year-old son with classic autism, this was a hard book for me to pick up. If I had not met Stephen at conferences and been awe-struck by his honesty and courage, I may have never opened the book. Although it was painful to revisit my dream for what was not to be, it was well worth the price. In Beyond the Wall, Stephen Shore emerges as a role model for children and adults and as an interpreter of the experience for parents and professionals. This little volume is a beacon of hope and a model of acceptance, and I recommend it with enthusiasm.

Diagnosed with “atypical development with strong autistic tendencies” and nonverbal until four years old, Stephen Shore was once recommended for residential placement. Because his parents believed in him, they rejected that idea, which was fortunate for their family and the world. Stephen is now completing his doctoral degree at Boston University in special education. He has a focus on helping people on the autism spectrum to develop their capacities to the fullest extent possible-whatever that may be. By walking us through his life story with insight and simplicity, Stephen guides the reader to an awareness of the different way of being which he shares with people on the spectrum. His ability to articulate his experiences clearly and with humor make the book seem like a friendly visit with the author.

The author begins by describing a typical day in his life including his strong sensitivities that are the residue of his earlier autism. The sound of a bluejay which may be pleasant to most in the early morning feels like the beak is scraping his eardrum. Shaving feels like a power sander on his chin, so Stephen maintains a beard. He rides his bicycle almost everywhere he goes not just for exercise and relaxation, but also for stimulation and to avoid smelly public transportation-and to meet people with a similar interest. Then based upon his mother's recollections and supplemented by family photos throughout, the author reports on his early life as a quiet and gentle infant who shocked his family by rolling over at eight days. By ten months, he was walking and often turning in circles with a finger in his ear.

As a toddler, Stephen would not kiss his father because of the aversive smell of coffee on his breath and the unbearable scratchiness of his moustache. By the age of four, he entered a therapeutic nursery school which had a strong psychoanalytic bent and only four other children in his class. There his speech resumed but with echolalia. His diagnosis was upgraded to “neurotic,” and he was able to go to a nursery school in a Jewish Community Center, but he struggled to relate to other children. This difficulty continues into public school kindergarten a year late where the author describes the wonder of learning and the terror of being teased. Many readers will find direction here in helping their children cope with bullying.

There is so much of value in Stephen's story, such as how he learned to develop friendships through common activities and the role that music has played in his life. By high school, there was more wonder than terror at school. Dating was an intriguing puzzle for the author, but by his college years, it was another dilemma he was able to solve. In the book we are treated to a brief contribution by his wife, Yi Liu, whom the author met as a fellow graduate student in music. The world of work was no less perplexing, and again the author takes us into his confidence and reveals his struggles to find a niche that works for him.

As a way of concluding, the author summarizes with simplicity and clarity his understanding of the autism spectrum. This is done in way that makes the concepts intelligible to families regardless of the individual differences of their child. Perhaps more than anything, Stephen Shore brings us as readers to an acceptance and appreciation for people who are different. With the simplicity and directness of a child, the author shares his well earned knowledge and wisdom. Beyond the Wall is on my “short list” of books about autism; it deserves your attention.

Autistic basketball sensation's inspiring year

Jason McElwain, 18, discusses how one night transformed his life

TODAY

Updated: 2:26 p.m. ET Feb. 20, 2007

A year to the day after he stunned everyone by coming off the bench to score 20 points in four minutes in a high-school basketball game, autistic teen-ager Jason McElwain says he hopes his story is still inspiring others to set goals and achieve their dreams.

"What more can you want?" the 18-year-old Rochester, N.Y.-area boy said in an interview on TODAY Thursday morning, as he recounted his year in the spotlight, which included a meeting with President Bush. "My life has changed from going to just an ordinary kid with autism to someone who is a hero."

Jason, then 17, was thrust into the spotlight when Greece Athena High School basketball coach Jim Johnson decided to send him onto the floor for a little play in the team's final regular season game against Spencerport on Feb. 16, 2006. Jason had never made the team but stayed on as team manager, and Coach Johnson thought a little playing time would be a fitting show of gratitude for his dedication.

Jason set the crowd into a frenzy when, after missing his first shot, he sank six three-pointers and a jump shot in the final four minutes. His achievement, captured on videotape, made him a national sensation.

Jason, known as "J-Mac" to friends in his upstate New York suburb, made appearances at the ESPY awards, the NCAA Final Four and the NBA finals. In addition to the president, he got to meet Oprah Winfrey, Peyton Manning and Jessica Simpson.

Letters still pour in from all over the world. People with autism write to thank Jason for serving as a beacon of hope for others.

"Can you look back at all and tell me what is has been like, Jason, to live in your shoes?" TODAY's Matt Lauer asked.

"It's been fun and amazing," said Jason.

Still playing basketball
In addition to his part-time job at a supermarket, Jason still plays in nightly pickup games at the "Y," but admits he has never been able to repeat the feat that got his name in newspapers and magazines from coast to coast.

"When you play with your buddies, do they kind of expect you to make every single shot?" Lauer asked.

"The expectations are really high, but not exactly," Jason said, laughing.

His parents, David and Debbie McElwain, who appeared on TODAY with Jason and his older brother Josh, said they still can't believe all of the attention Jason's performance has received.

"After that game when he scored 20 points, I thought, 'Gee, his name might be in the paper,' " David McElwain said.

Now there are even discussions about turning his life story into a book and movie. (Jason said that he thought Matthew McConaughey should portray him on film.)

'On a roll'
Debbie McElwain admitted that Jason sometimes can get "cocky" about his fame, but she and Josh bring him back down to Earth. She said she hopes Jason's story will encourage other families with autistic children to identify the symptoms early and get treatments designed to foster communication skills before it is too late.

"I never thought he would come this far," Debbie McElwain said of her son's disability, which was diagnosed when he was 2 1/2. "When your child is diagnosed with severe autism, you just want him to speak. Jason had most of the autistic symptoms of severe autism. It was just one hurdle after the next ... You just want him to say one word, because wants an autistic child says the first word, you are on a roll."

Jason's been on a roll ever since the big game, which his team won.

"I just hope more people are aware of autism, the disease autism," he said, "and that people know more about it and get the treatment they need with their children, early in life like my loving mother [did]."

Marked primarily by impaired social interaction and diminished communication skills, autism is a developmental disability believed to be caused by both genetic and environmental factors. Last week, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control issued a report estimating that one in 150 children born in this country are autistic — much more prevalent than previously thought.

Jason McElwain: A very unlikely hero

When autistic student Jason McElwain, left, shot the winning basket for his high school team, he became a national icon, fêted by the President and courted by Hollywood. But as Rupert Cornwell reports, his story may also raise awareness about his heartbreaking and little-understood condition

It was the last home game, and Jim Johnson, basketball coach at the Greece-Athena high school, thought: why not? His team were cruising to victory and there were just four minutes left on the clock. So he put in the 17-year-old kid who had worked so hard all season at keeping statistics, running the clock, and handing out bottles of water and endless encouragement. The gesture was meant as a reward. Instead, coach Johnson created a sporting fairy tale for the ages.

The kid in question wasn't just any kid. At the age of two, Jason McElwain had been diagnosed as autistic. So well, however, had he coped with the adversity that he became a hero to his schoolmates. He also became a relatively decent shooter of a basketball. But 5ft 6in is on the small side for a game where height counts for so much. However many times he tried out, the boy everyone knew as "J-Mac" could never quite get into the team proper - until those four magic minutes one evening last month. But only a Hollywood script writer could have imagined the real-life fantasy that would then entrance America.

In Jason's words, "I just caught fire, I was hot as a pistol". True, he missed his first two simple shots. But then, on the school gym floor, in front of 900 intensely involved spectators, he entered "the zone", the almost paranormal state where everything a sports player attempts turns to gold. His third effort rattled the board and dropped through the hoop. And then another, and another and another. By the time it was all over, Greece-Athena had put its local rival Spencerport to the sword with a 79-43 victory.

Jason alone accounted for 20 of the points, six long-range three-point shots and a two-pointer from closer in. Even though the Spencerport players didn't hustle him too aggressively, it was still four minutes of undiluted magic. When it was over, grown men were weeping as his teammates carried him off the court on their shoulders.

But this was only the beginning. If Britain has a soft spot for gallant losers and epic no-hopers, America's special weakness is for the feel-good happy ending, for the outsider who takes life's odds stacked against him and then tosses them to the four winds. In horse-racing there was Seabiscuit, the little runt of a racehorse who in the 1930s took on and beat the mighty War Admiral, champion of the country's snobbish racing establishment - and in doing so became a symbol of national resilience in the Depression era.

Or take the never-say-die heroics of baseball's Kirk Gibson, the injured Los Angeles Dodger who limped to the plate and then smashed a home run that set his team on the way to the 1988 World Series. From a TV commentator, the feat elicited one of the great lines of sports broadcasting. "I don't believe what I've just seen."

And so it was with Jason McElwain, on a mid-February evening in Rochester in upstate New York - an example not only of an event witnessed at firsthand yet which still beggars belief - but also of how a frightening and imperfectly understood medical condition need not be a barrier to success.

His feat has set in motion an extraordinary, "only-in-America" saga. The local papers were first to get hold of the story, then came national coverage, the interviews on the network news, the videoed clips of J-Mac's scoring spree shown over and over again. And, as was inevitable in a land where the distinctions between real life and the silver screen have long since disappeared, Hollywood got in on the act as well.

Disney has expressed interest. So too has none other than Earvin "Magic" Johnson, legendary superstar of the Los Angeles Lakers NBA team, now proprietor of a chain of urban cinemas, who called coach Johnson to discuss the movie rights to J-Mac's amazing story.

And so it has continued, right up to Tuesday when McElwain was summoned to a meeting at Rochester airport with the former baseball owner, incurable mountain biker and lifelong sports fan who is now the most important man in America. And such is J-Mac's fame and popularity that the person who had most to gain from the encounter was George W Bush.

As is well known, these are not the best of times for Mr Bush, beset by deepening crisis in Iraq, spurned even by members of his own party, and with an approval rating sinking close to Nixonian levels. This week the President was up in the Rochester area, trying to drum up support for a Medicare prescription drugs programme that has attracted only criticism since it was introduced in 2005. But before he got down to serious matters, he obeyed rule number one of the politician's survival manual. If you're not very popular yourself, start rubbing shoulders with people who are. Right now, that means J-Mac.

"I saw it on TV. Saw it on TV and I wept, just like a lot of other people did," he said in that weirdly syncopated style patented by presidents whose surname is Bush. "It's the story of a young man who found his touch on the basketball court, which in turn touched the heart of citizens all around the country."

It was also a cameo, too, of what Mr Bush sees as a uniquely American generosity of spirit that he never fails to extol - a story of "coach Johnson's willingness to give a person a chance, a story of Dave and Debbie's [the McElwain parents] deep love for their son." And as so often in America, the hucksterish and the noble march hand in hand. J-Mac's moment of glory is being celebrated in commemorative T-shirts, masks and mugs as well as a possible movie. Casual Friday, a Rochester-based clothing company, is donating 500 T-shirts. Each will be emblazoned with J-Mac's mantra - "Stay Focused", with a photo of the improbable basketball star being carried off the court in triumph.

But the message on the back of the T-shirt suggests that, just maybe, Jason's celebrity will last longer than 15 minutes, and that his accomplishment will help change attitudes about the neurological condition from which he has suffered all his life, for which no cure has yet been discovered. "J-Mac," it proclaims, "Six three-pointers for Athena ... One slam dunk for Autism."

Jason didn't talk till he was five - "and since then he probably hasn't stopped," says Dave McElwain. Some autistic children are withdrawn and utterly uncommunicative. Jason, who has a relatively mild form of autism, tends to the opposite extreme. "He's very social, he's a charmer," adds his father. At school, he has special-needs instruction, but attends regular classes as well.

In Jason's case, the illness shows itself in fearlessness, even recklessness, but he is also faithful to the obsessive focus and pursuit of a goal that is a hallmark of the autistic person. "He's never had any fear of doing anything," his father says, "or fear of what other people think."

Such imperviousness probably helped him put aside the mishap of missing his first two easy shots that now legendary evening, when other "ordinary" players might have lost heart.

The broader hope now is that Jason's compelling story will give yet more impetus to the search for a cure, and prod the federal government that Mr Bush runs to make more resources available to that purpose.

In cultural and social terms, autism may be more easily accepted than before. But severe cases can wreak havoc on entire families. One out of 166 children in the US is born autistic. The divorce rate for their parents can hit 90 per cent. If the emotional strains are devastating, the financial burdens can be no less ruinous. Home care and therapy for an autistic child can cost anything up to $90,000 (£55,000) a year - usually without insurance cover. If Jason McElwain's night of glory gives some people hope where there was none before, that will be its most precious legacy.

As for the young man himself, he professes to be unmoved by his celebrity, the film talk, the Presidential arm draped around his shoulder at Rochester airport, and the rest of the carry-on. His ambitions are unchanged: to get his high school diploma, go to community college, and then work at the local grocery store. Somehow though, you suspect, it will not be so simple

Bugra Cankir

Bugra Cankir

Bugra Cankir: A Musical Savant in Turkey

The savant web site continues to bring to attention savants from around the world. The parents of Bugra Cankir provided information about him recently. Bugra is now 13 years old. He lives in Hatay/Iskenderun in Turkey on the Mediterranan coast.

Bugra was diagnosed with autistic disorder at age 3. At that time he was detached and distant although he showed exceptional memory skills and interest in, and expertise, with PC games. Language and social skills remained problems, though. Through intensive therapy and education he made good gains overall however, although language has remained limited.

At age 3 ½ his parents gave him puzzle boards that had alphabet letters. By putting those letters together into words, he started to read in a few days. Soon he was reading (decoding) every word. Bugra completed pre-school in a Montessori program and then entered primary school. He is now in regular classrooms but he is almost always accompanied by his mother in those classes, however, so he can be fully involved in the curriculum and lessons.

Bugra was not really exposed any formal music training until about age 10. His parents thought that music might provide an added color and richness to his life so they engaged a private teacher to give lessons. According to his parents Bugra “progress was amazing, as if he were absorbing and the music teacher’s knowledge and experience like downloading files. He memorized many songs and played them on a keyboard by ear. Three or four months later the teacher told us ‘I have nothing more to teach him.” The teacher also felt Bugra had perfect pitch and recommended testing for that and that he should continue advanced lessons with another teacher.”

Testing by University of California Genetics of Absolute Pitch study group in 2004 did confirm the presence of absolute pitch. In a report to the parents that project reported that Bugra was one of the youngest participants in their project and he “has the highest level of absolute pitch. His score of the pure tone test at 31 exceeds the cut-off point of 24.5 points and his score on the piano tone test of 33 exceeds the cut-off point of 27.8.” Even more impressively, and rare, a repeat of that testing in 2006 showed Bugra to have done even better, recording a “perfect score” of 36/36 for both pure tone and piano tone.

In 2004 an advanced piano teacher, Mrs. Hilal Onal, began to work with Bugra six to ten hours per week. Bugra had his first recital one year later where he played J.S. Bach’s Minuet in D Major and M. Clementi’s Sonatina in C Minor. The teacher told the parents Bugra had completed two years work in one year’s time. In April, 2006 Bugra passed the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music Grade 1 examination “with distinction”. He passed the Grade 2 examination “with distinction” in January, 2007 and then passed the Grade 3 examination, also “with distinction”, in May, 2007

In July, 2006 Bugra was invited to participate and perform at the Autism: Art & Music conference hosted by the Autism Research Centre of the University of Cambridge in London, England which was held on September 17, 2006. Bugra appeared as one of twelve exceptional musicians with Autistic or Asperger’s Disorder who performed at that event, including Derek Paravicini. There were a number of artists who displayed their art works at that event as well, including Stephen Wiltshire, Gilles Trehin and Yeak Ping Lian who are also profiled on this site.

As is the case with so many savants, Bugra did develop calendar calculating abilities and has became quite expert at that skill. Given a date, he can provide the day of the week instantly and correctly. But his interest in piano is foremost, perhaps, his parents speculate, because “there is nothing unfamiliar anymore about calendars” yet the higher and higher level of achievements possible with the piano continue to challenge and motivate him to ever increasing musical ability. A video posted by his parents demonstrate Bugra’s ability and style.

Video of 2 Autistic Savants in the mid-sixties

An interesting video dating from the mid-Sixties where two autistic savants are interviewed...displaying amazing ability with date calculations, but nearly no ability on awareness of simple facts.

Matt Savage

In 2000, when Matt Savage was just 8 years old, he played piano for Dave Brubeck and jammed at a sound session with Chick Corea and his sidemen, Avishai Cohen and Jeff Ballard. The following year he was invited to a soundcheck to jam with jazz great McCoy Tyner and his sidemen, Avery Sharpe and Al Foster. In 2003, at the age of 11, Matt debuted at the famed Blue Note in Manhattan. The following year he debuted at Birdland, performing with the legendary Clark Terry on trumpet, Jimmy Heath on sax, Jon Faddis on trumpet, Marcus McLaurine on bass and Kenny Washington on drums. By 2005, Matt had performed twice with Chaka Khan. News of Matt Savage's talent has spread throughout the jazz world. As jazz great Bobby Watson said, “Besides being an extremely gifted pianist and improviser, Matt has the musical instincts of a person many years older. To me this is the most incredible characteristic about Matt.”

True to that statement, Matt hasn't been just jammin'with the greats for the past six years. He's been using those instincts to amass an impressive body of original work that has gained the respect of his peers and fans alike. Quantum Leap (Savage Records), the superb new album from The Matt Savage Trio, features Matt on piano with his adult sidemen, John Funkhouser on bass and Steve Silverstein on drums. Quantum Leap also represents the Trio's first album to receive worldwide distribution via a new deal with Palmetto Records (MRI/RED). Produced by Diane Savage, and to be released in September of 2006, the new album will mark the Trio's return to Manhattan for a special concert release party.

What I love about jazz," says Matt, "is that you can break all the rules and be free. Matt has taken that freedom to new heights on Quantum Leap, showcasing versatile techniques on such original compositions as Curacao," Blues in 33/8"and "Serenity." He has also featured several standards on the new album, including "All the Things You Are" (Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II), "Monk's Dream" (Thelonious Monk) and A Child is Born" (Thad Jones), all delivered in Savage's unique interpretive style. Quantum Leap is the fifth release from The Matt Savage Trio. Their acclaimed previous album, "Cutting Loose, was released in 2004 and marked the Trio's first performance at Birdland. Cutting Loose was preceded by “Chasing Your Tail, "Groovin' on Mount Everest"and their debut 2001 album, All Jazzed Up.

From the very beginning of Matt's music career, despite his young age, the jazz community embraced this amazing young talent. Following his 2000 performance for Dave Brubeck, WGME-TV in Portland, Maine aired Brubeck's prophetic comments: I was amazed at how talented he is. Amazing is the word I can tell you. He has such a musical mind that it isn't music that he has to learn. It seems like he's such an advanced musician in so many ways already at 8.”

Matt was just 6 1/2 when his musical journey began. At that time, he taught himself to read piano music and immediately began studies in classical piano. He switched to Jazz after discovering the music of Thelonious Monk, John Coltrane and Miles Davis. Matt studied for 3 years at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston and recorded his first solo album in 1999 in collaboration with the New England Conservatory, becoming the youngest child to perform at the NEPTA “Gifted and Talented"classical recitals in 2000.

Matt's second solo album, “Live at the Olde Mill,” was released in 2001, a year which proved pivotal in Matt's career as media recognition began to accelerate. Sparked by a live radio performance and interview on Boston's WERS 88.9 and an excellent review in “The Boston Globe," Matt began selling out concerts. That same year, The Matt Savage Trio released their live concert album, “All Jazzed Up,” and radio stations across the country were broadcasting performances and interviews with Matt. He appeared on “Lifetime Television"and did an interview with Barbara Walters for ABC's “20/20.”

The media momentum continued in 2002. In February, he received his first album review on the “All About Jazz" website and was heralded as "phenomenal." National Public Radio's "All Things Considered" aired a detailed piece about Matt that became one of the most listened to programs of the year and won numerous broadcast journalism awards. The Matt Savage Trio performed at the famed New Orleans Jazz Festival, and Matt appeared on "The Today Show," "The View," "Montel" and "The Discovery Channel."

In May 2003, The Matt Savage Trio released their third album,"Chasing Your Tail,” recorded live at the Kravis Center in West Palm Beach, Florida. Matt was signed by Bösendorfer pianos, becoming the youngest person and only child, in their 178-year history, to become a Bösendorfer artist. In November of 2003, The Matt Savage Trio made their debut at the Blue Note, documented in a Time magazine article citing Matt as the youngest performer to have played the famed venue. Matt ended the year performing with more jazz greats at the Kennedy Center for NPR's live broadcast, Jazz Piano Christmas,” sharing the stage with The Bad Plus, Arturo O'Farrill, Jason Moran, Stefon Harris, Karrin Allyson and Lynne Ariale.

Awards for Matt's musical accomplishments have been many. Among them, Matt earned ASCAP's 2004/2005 "Young Jazz Composer"award for his composition, “The Wild Rose,” from the Trio's "Cutting Loose" CD. He received the award at the ASCAP Jazz Wall Convention in New York, being honored along with living legends Neal Hefti, Shirley Horn and John "Bucky" Pizzarelli. This year, he received a second award from ASCAP as one of their 2005/2006 "Young Jazz Composer" winners for his composition, "Serenity." He not only received his award at this year's Jazz Wall Convention, but he performed "Serenity for the jazz greats attending the coveted event.

Throughout Matt's amazing young career, there have been numerous performances and appearances to support children and adults with disabilities and to support community outreach efforts to educate people about autism spectrum disorders. It is no small wonder, considering Matt has made an extraordinary emergence from his own autism, diagnosed at the age of 3. At that age, Matt could not communicate easily or withstand noises, not to mention music. His parents enrolled Matt in a special program for children with autism that involved patient training and a strict dietary and vitamin regime (the DAN Protocol). From age 3 to 7 Matt underwent speech therapy and occupational therapy. At age 6 1/2 he did a special auditory integration therapy to retrain his ears and make them less sensitive to sound. Matt was able to retune his sensory and social perceptions and his musical skills flourished. By 7 1/2 he had recorded his first album. In a remarkably short amount of time, Matt has emerged as an artist who is comfortable performing in front of audiences of all sizes. He is a welcomed, articulate and outgoing personality on national television and radio shows.

Matt's journey has been documented in a worldwide broadcast in 2006 of a film entitled Beautiful Minds - A Voyage into the Brain, a three-part series produced by German ARD television. Another highlight of 2006 was Matt's special appearance in April at MoMA, The Museum of Modern Art in New York City, in conjunction with the premiere of the three-part documentary Ellington by Keys"produced by award-winning filmmaker, Gary Keys. Several of the compositions performed by Matt were from original Ellington manuscripts that had never before been published or performed.

Matt Savage keeps good company with the music of the jazz greats, past and present. His enormous respect for their legendary bodies of work inspires and fuels his own unique jazz compositions and interpretations. As People Magazine astutely wrote in 2002, "...jazz phenom Matt Savage unlocks a door to genius using 88 keys." With the release of each album, Matt has challenged genius by exploring and expanding his creative boundaries. At the age of 14, Matt continues to have vision and technique beyond his years as a composer and musician. Quantum Leap launches yet another chapter in Matt Savage's musical evolution as fans celebrate his prodigious rise in the world of jazz.

CWA with Musical Savant Skills

These are CWA with exceptional musical talents....not documented by I believe the videos because I have past and present students with the same savant skills be it Math or Music.Most of the time they go together,the skills in Math and Music.

Enjoy and believe me there are more of these kids all around the world.

The Camera Man Stephen Wiltshire

In February 1987, the BBC aired a program on Savant Syndrome entitled "The Foolish Wise Ones." One segment featured a then twelve-year old autistic boy, Stephen Wiltshire, drawing from memory on camera a remarkably accurate sketch of St. Pancras station which he had visited for the first time only briefly several hours before. As the camera recorded, he quickly and assuredly drew the elaborate and complicated building exactly as he had seen it with the clock hands set at precisely 11:20, the hour he had viewed them.

There were hundreds of calls and letters to the BBC following that broadcast seeking a source to purchase originals of Stephen's astonishing work. That initial interest and then a sustained demand for the drawings led to the publication of an entire volume of his works entitled Drawings, (J.M. Dent & Sons, Ltd, London, 1987)

In the introduction to Drawings, Sir Hugh Casson, former president of the Royal Academy, says of Stephen: "Happily, every now and then, a rocket of young talent explodes and continues to shower us with its sparks. Stephen Wiltshire — who was born with severe speech difficulties — is one of those rockets." He then describes the artistic brilliance further: "His sense of perspective seems to be faultless… I've never seen in all my competition drawing such a talent, such a natural and extraordinary talent, that this child seems to have… (Stephen) is possibly the best child artist in Britain."

Stephen concentrates almost exclusively on architecture. He provides exact, literal renditions of any building, no matter how complex, and in fact he seems to prefer the especially intricate. He views buildings, in person or from a photograph, and retains an exquisitely precise and detailed image for later recall and drawing. Additionally, he can sense and draw a building, no matter how complex, with a three-dimensional perspective from a two-dimensional photo.

Like other savant artists, Stephen's work depicts exactly what he sees without embellishment, stylization, or interpretation. He makes no notes; impressions are indelibly and faithfully inscribed from a single exposure for later recall and he draws swiftly, beginning anywhere on the page. Thus, like Alonzo Clemons and Richard Wawro, his remarkable artistic ability is linked to an equally remarkable memory.

At age of ten Stephen drew what he called a "London Alphabet," a group of drawings from Albert Hall to the London Zoo with structures such as the House of Parliament and The Imperial War Museum in between. An exquisite sense of perspective is demonstrated in a drawing he titles "Looking down the lift shaft and stairs," and his drawing of Buckingham Palace is a spectacular example of Stephen's intricacy and accuracy.

Stephen is, by any standards, an extraordinary artist, but what about his handicap? Stephen started attending Queensmill, a school in London for children with special needs, at the age of five, as an extremely withdrawn and almost mute child. He existed in the world of his own so typically described in autistic youngsters. He was distant, preoccupied, had little or no eye contact and often roamed about classrooms aimlessly, sometimes staring for long times at pictures, then suddenly dashing from room to room. He would absorb himself for long periods of time with scribbling on scraps of paper.

In school he did learn to read and began to immerse himself for hours in books on architecture and travel. Simultaneously he developed some language, but it remained difficult and sparse. He was characterized by the headmistress of the special school as having a "gentle personality, humor and curious dignity." Overall he was described as eminently likable and far from detracting from his general development, his art seemingly aided it. While there was some fear that acquisition of language and other skills might, like Nadia, rob him of his genius, that has not been the case at all. Instead, like with Leslie and Alonzo, Stephen's special skills and overall social development have progressed simultaneously. The blossoming of his genius has coincided with the blossoming of his personality.

In the summer of 1993 an additional talent of Stephen's — music — was quite unexpectedly discovered. While Stephen had always liked to listen to music, and to sing, always in tune and often imitating other great singers, to his music teacher's surprise it was discovered Stephen had perfect pitch and considerable talent as a musical savant with some of the innate sense of the 'rules of music' characteristic of such savants. While simultaneous skills in several areas have been reported in some other savants, such multiple skills are really very rare in an already rare condition. Stephen shows much prowess in both music and art. Stephen's story, and a fuller description of his art and music abilities, can be found in his books and also described in Oliver Sack's 1995 book An Anthropologist on Mars.

Perhaps the most striking and astonishing display of Stephen's remarkable visual memory and drawing ability occurs in a segment on a 2001 BBC documentary entitled Fragments of Genius. In this segment Stephen is taken on a helicopter ride over the city of London. After a brief ride, he returns to the ground where, in three hours, he completes a stunningly detailed and remarkably accurate drawing of London from the air which spans four square miles with 12 major landmarks and 200 other buildings drawn to perfect perspective and scale. Words cannot describe the prodigious ability and visual memory that drawing documents; it needs to be seen to be appreciated. A Stephen Wiltshire Calendar 2003 features such a drawing called London Eye on the January-March 2003 page. This calendar is made available through a cooperative agreement between the Pendock Company of London, the magazine Architecture Today and The National Autistic Society and it can be accessed on the web with the title The Stephen Wiltshire Calendar 2003 as that heading appears on the search engine Google.

Daniel Tammet

Lucky numbers

CATHERINE DEVENEY

CONVERSATION, says Daniel Tammet, is like a dance: a dance for two people. You have to know the moves. We dance, he and I, in a simple room. A table. Chairs. Big windows. I tread carefully, listening only to the rhythm of the dance. But for Tammet there is competing music, a background cacophony that fills his head against the main track. Colours, sounds, light, textures. Right now he's noticing the way the light streams through the window and hits the door. He's noticing the smooth, polished wood of the table, the noisy hum of the air-conditioning. When I move he even hears the faint jangle of my jewellery. I take my bracelet off, lay it on the table in front of us with a clank, a sprawl of black and silvery grey beads that reflect the light.

Sometimes, when he feels almost assaulted by stimuli, Tammet holds something in the palm of his hand: a stone perhaps, a marble, a coin. It calms him. If very agitated, he walks in circles because the regularity of the movement soothes him. But perhaps I make him sound visibly odd, which would be wrong. You would walk by this gentle, slight, bespectacled figure in the street and not guess at his remarkable possibilities. But if you could open him up, if you could see inside his head and experience the world as he does, then you might be amazed. Tammet has Asperger's syndrome, a high-functioning form of autism. But he is also one of the world's few savants, a rare condition highlighted in the Dustin Hoffman film Rain Man, which makes him capable of remarkable mental feats. A television documentary film later dubbed Tammet 'Brainman'.

Tammet speaks ten languages; he can learn a new one in under a week. He can perform at lightning speed mathematical calculations involving the multiplication of three-digit figures in his head. And he can recite the number pi (the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter) to 22,000 places without getting a single digit wrong, a feat that takes five hours. Depending on how you look at it, Tammet represents either the untapped potential of the human mind, or merely a quirk of brain malfunction.

We are all of us to some extent trapped inside our own heads. Most of us can describe what it is like in there, in the way we can describe a familiar room. The nooks and crannies, the hidden corners, the colour of our mental walls. Some of us can even describe our own quirks and eccentricities and neuroses. But while people with autism often seem in a world of their own, ironically they have little sense of 'self' and usually cannot describe their world. Autism has become one of those words, like 'dyslexia', that is overused and misused, a kind of shorthand label to cover a whole range of conditions. "There are as many forms of autism as there are people with the condition," explains Tammet. But, in general, those with both high-functioning and low-functioning autism will have communication problems that, to a greater or lesser degree, make it difficult for them to cope with the normal etiquette of social interaction: eye contact, empathy, listening and responding. Their language may be repetitive, their voices monotone. Signs of affection are often limited. They may have narrow fixations, be drawn to repetitive activity and resist change. But at the same time, they are often more sensitive to sights, sounds and smells than the rest of us.

Autism affects six times as many males as females, and Professor Simon Baron-Cohen, of the Autism Research Unit at Cambridge University, believes the discrepancy between the genders may be partly explained by exposure to the male hormone in the womb. "Prenatal testosterone levels, together with as yet unidentified genetic factors, may predispose boys to be more at risk from autism," he says.

Those with low-functioning autism may be affected by low IQ and learning difficulties that make communication difficult. But people with Asperger's will often have normal or above-average IQ. Over time, some, like Tammet, may be able to teach themselves skills they naturally lack. You wouldn't guess now, but as a child Tammet found eye contact almost impossible. "I used to look at the mouth when people talked because that was the part of their face that moved. It was a real effort for me to look someone in the eye because I found it almost a little painful, too intense or uncomfortable. I felt too much inside myself and it was too much of a release to look someone in the eye. You get such a lot of emotion in the eyes."

Shadow man. Emotions, he says, fall like mysterious shadows across him. He cannot always define them. He went to the cinema once and watched five trailers before the main feature, then burst into tears. "My brain couldn't filter them, couldn't cope with that much emotion. If I find something very moving, it won't be a gradual sensation of being moved to tears, I will just burst into tears suddenly."

The brain is the most exciting, most mysterious part of all of us. Tammet's is more mysterious still, even to himself. Savants and people with autism live in a remarkable world. Rarely can they describe it. But at the age of 27, Tammet has reached a stage where he can. It has not been without effort. He remembers as a child the first time that he went into a library and was confronted by thousands of books. All of them had a name on the spine. He spent ages searching the shelves, looking for the book with his name on it. "I thought," he says, "that I would find it and open it and understand who I am."

tammet was different long before he knew he was different. As a child his 'otherness' to his contemporaries was of no consequence. They simply did not exist in his very solitary universe. Even before he could read he loved the books that his parents read. It was not just the silence they prompted, it was the fact that there were numbers on every page. He would take as many books as possible to his room and simply surround himself with them, "kind of like a numerical comfort blanket".

He has synaesthesia, which means he sees numbers in colour and has an emotional response to them. "People with synaesthesia will say four is green or five is black, but what makes my experience of numbers so unusual is that it's much more complex than that. Nine is not just a colour, it's a shape, a size, an emotional content." His favourite number is four because it is shy, just like him. "Numbers were my friends. Before I could relate to other people, I could relate to numbers."

But by the age of eight or nine, some awareness of loneliness kicked in. "I wanted to find a friend desperately." He would sit on his bed in his room and stare at the ceiling, wondering how a person got a friend. He had no idea. Other children were put off by his strangeness, his unusual fixations - at one point it was ladybirds - and his inability to follow the steps of the intricate dance of conversation. And then another unusual boy came to the school. "He was from an immigrant family and very intelligent. He loved numbers and loved language, and we got on for that reason. He didn't care so much that I was different because he was different."

He accepts his condition may be genetic. His grandfather suffered from severe epilepsy, his father from severe depression. Medical science at the time had no answers for his grandfather's condition. He was put in a home and his wife was told to remarry and forget him - he might as well be dead. And very soon he was. "I think," says Tammet, "if my grandfather could have known me, he would have been proud of me."

When Tammet had an epileptic seizure at the age of four, his father's own experience made him quick to act. His speed saved the boy's life. Epilepsy is common among those with autism, but Tammet outgrew the condition and has suffered no seizures since. But it has left an interesting question mark. He has no pre-seizure memories, and therefore no way of knowing if he had any savant abilities at that age. Some scientists believe Tammet may be an 'acquired savant', rather than a born savant, and that his abilities are in some way connected to damage caused by the seizure.

Dr Darold Treffert, clinical professor at the University of Wisconsin Medical School, author of Extraordinary People and consultant on Rain Man, believes acquired savant skills suggest there may be "a little Rain Man in all of us". He believes savant syndrome may be caused by damage to the left hemisphere of the brain, with dramatic right-hemisphere compensation. "While savant syndrome is a malfunction of the brain," he explains, "perhaps it is that malfunction that releases dormant capacity as a back-up system."

But there is no conclusive evidence about savant syndrome. The idea of dormant brain function in all of us may be "romantic optimism", according to Baron-Cohen, who adds that "there is no consensus" about left-hemisphere damage. His interest in Tammet lies in discovering if there is something in the combination of synaesthesia and Asperger's that has caused Tammet's savantism.

Some savant abilities are remarkable because of the person's general limitations. Treffert describes them as "islands of brilliance" that float in a general sea of disability. The person might have a gift for drawing or for music or for calculation that is remarkable given their other limitations. But prodigious savants, as they are sometimes called, have gifts that would be remarkable in any person. They are very rare. What makes Tammet rarer still is that even prodigious savant skills often exist alongside very low IQ and serious physical handicap such as blindness. Leslie Lemke, for example, is blind, mute and has cerebral palsy. Yet the American can play an entire piano concerto flawlessly after hearing it only once.

It was for an epilepsy charity that Tammet recited pi to 22,000 places. The numbers, he says, rolled in front of his eyes like a moving numerical landscape. I tell him that reading his account prompted a strange sensation in me. I actually felt frightened, almost nauseous. He nods. He understands that? Well, he was too wrapped up in the numbers to have any sense of this himself. But he was told afterwards how emotional people in the audience were. Some were almost crying. Some looked very intense, others were simply fascinated. One who was interviewed afterwards said it was almost like a spiritual experience, like watching someone recite holy scripture from memory.

Tammet is not displeased with the analogy. "I thought, wow. The number pi meant such a lot to me, but it amazed me that the process of reciting it, of making it public, had touched other people as well. Pi is a very private number. Most people only know it to a few places, if that. I was able to unearth to the public gaze 22,000 places, a flow of numbers people had never experienced before."

Perhaps what prompted my fear was some uneasy feeling that it reduced the human brain - and the human condition - to something mechanistic: an accident, a malfunction. We were simply electrical circuits, and if the wiring went wrong strange things would happen. It was a paradox: it was both mysterious and yet it somehow removed mystery. But Tammet says his brain is not a machine. "Numbers are my friends. There is real emotion there. Machines can't have friends."

Interestingly, there is a spiritual dimension to his brain. It prompts his one criticism of the best-selling novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, which is written from the perspective of a 15-year-old boy with Asperger's. The author, Mark Haddon, made a good job of describing anxiety, the need for repetition and the love of numbers, he says. But Tammet found the dismissal of religion as "illogical", a bit stereotypical.

His own belief in God began after reading the Christian writer GK Chesterton. (He can't help wondering if Chesterton was also a savant and autistic.) "For most people, religion is an emotional thing. For me, it is primarily intellectual, although there is emotion there as well. Life is a magical thing. The explanation of religion is crazy in a sense, but life is no less crazy. The mystery of it is just as weird and wonderful as religion's explanation of it. When scientists try to break everything down there's always a piece missing."

Perhaps unsurprisingly, given his reverence for numbers, the mystery of the Trinity draws him. One in three, three in one. But what sense does his brain, which makes concrete pictures even of numbers, have of an abstract God? "What is God made out of if he is not made of flesh and bones?" he muses. "He is, by his very nature, love and relationship. The process of loving somebody creates something that is separate from either person, the lover or the loved. Of course, if a man and woman get together they can produce a child, and in a sense that is the human trinity. That is how I conceive of God, as a relationship."

It is not to science but to love that Tammet attributes the biggest breakthrough in his Asperger's. He met his partner, Neil, in 2000. Before that, of course, his parents loved him. But parents have no choice. Neil had a choice. "I had no idea if I was a person who could be loved," Tammet admits. "I had no sense of myself."

Afterwards, he realised how emotionally flat his life had been. His mother, for example, had been the woman who gave him food and kissed him goodnight, but he had given little back in emotional response. But Neil made him see the world differently. "Falling in love really sharpened my emotions, drew them out of me, made me realise emotions weren't my enemies, not things I had to wrestle with, but things that could actually bring me great joy and happiness and peace. They could take away the feelings of anxiety, of not belonging, of being disconnected from the world."

Tammet works from home running an internet-based teaching business. Practically, he is very dependent on Neil, who has to shave him because his co-ordination skills are so poor. But is he emotionally more vulnerable than most? Could he cope with losing Neil? "It's the thing I fear more than anything else. Emotions like grief are so raw, and I am frightened of experiencing them because I don't know how I would cope. Neil understands me totally and has no problem with the way I am. If he was gone from my life I don't know how I would cope. It's a terrifying thought for me."

Tammet's favourite book is The Little Prince. He loves the idea in it that if you looked into a sea of a million people, it is the person you love that your eye would single out. This is how it is for him. "There are so many things going on in here, but if my partner walked in now he is all I would see."

finally there will be a book with Daniel Tammet's name on the spine. And it will explain who he is. In Born on a Blue Day, both his difficulties and his awakening consciousness of himself and others are charted. The miracle is that he wrote it himself.

To scientists, Tammet represents a rare opportunity. "Most savants, you can see what they do," says Treffert, "but they can't describe what they do. Some people look at Tammet and say, 'We can see his ability, but where is his disability?' But when you read his book you see that disability was evident earlier on. The good news is that some autistic features and behaviour can lessen."

Autism is such a sad condition for parents to deal with. Tammet likes giving hope. Just before he was born his mother had a kind of premonition that her son would be different. "Whatever happens, we'll love him, just love him," she told her husband, and then she began to cry.

Now Tammet is proud to be different. "If there is one thing my example can do for people, not just on the autistic spectrum, it is to show that being different is not necessarily a bad thing. Each person to me is unique and amazing," he says.

Life is messy. Tammet's story does not end totally happily. His father's depressive illness has deteriorated sharply and Tammet has been unable to speak to him for many months. "His illness has gone beyond the point where he is rational," he explains. His mother relied on her husband; they had nine children together. Now she, too, has depression. "I do everything I can to help her cope with losing my father, because I don't think he will ever come back." His empathy tells its own powerful story of how far he has come.

He has enough sense of self now to be comfortable being Daniel Tammet. He even sees why he might be loved. Love, he says, has no equation, and when you love someone that person is ultimately a reason for loving. "There is something in me that my partner can't see in anyone else. And it's the same for me." It's like when he recited pi, he explains. People asked why. And the only thing he could say was for pi's own sake: he found the number beautiful. A strange, quiet beauty, like Tammet's own.