Autism

Naoki Hidishida has severe, nonverbal autism. Using an alphabet grid he was able to document his experiences of autism in his first book, The Reason I Jump, when he was 13 years old. Fall Down 7 Times, Get Up 8 (excerpted below) is his further account of life as a young adult navigating the world with autism, and was translated by the novelist David Mitchell with KA Yoshid

Leo Bracaliello, a 2-year-old child who has been diagnosed with autism, sits cross-legged on his white carpet, his big blue eyes fixated on the face of a robot, singing in monotone, “If you’re happy and you know it…” When the song finishes, Leo mumbl

The Japanese author of The Reason I Jump and Fall Down 7 Times Get Up 8 describes what it’s like to be a person with nonverbal autism