The Reason I Jump by Naoki Higashida.

Random House 2007, translation by KA Yoshida and David Mitchell 2013

Review by Jeffrey Aaron

I…hope that, by reading this book, you might become a better friend of someone with autism.

~Naoki Higashida

Naoki Higashida is thirteen years old, Japanese, and severely autistic - enough “to make verbal communication pretty much impossible.” With computer technology, he has been able, with assistance, to write a book that describes his life experience with his disability, as he refers to his autism. In his introduction, David Mitchell states that it helped him understand his autistic son more than anything else he had ever read about autism, including other books by autistic authors.

Mitchell explains that the mind of a person with autism is “a room where twenty radios, all tuned to different stations, are blaring out voices and music. The…room you’re in has no door or window, and relief will come only when you’re too exhausted to stay awake.” At times, while Higashida is dealing with this daily chaotic sensory input, people will ask him questions or give him instructions. As he tries to absorb each word of the question or instruction, one at a time, he finds himself repeating the question over and over at the same time he is trying to find the words to answer. He trips over his own words as he considers them, also one at a time, forgets the question and therefore repeats it to hang onto it while he is trying to answer. Sometimes verbal “junk” will spill out of his mouth, which he cannot control, sometimes in a strange voice, while his mind is still racing, leading people to treat him like a child or an idiot. It can make him hate himself at such times. And yet, “I’ve learned that every human being, with or without disabilities, needs to strive to do their best, and by striving for happiness you will arrive at happiness.” What this reviewer read between the lines was that this intelligent young person has a far clearer understanding of others than they almost always do of him. Among other revelations, autism apparently has little to do with levels of “intelligence”, a concept which is too vague to be useful in many situations, a notion that can be completely misleading when used carelessly, and certainly inappropriate when assessing people with autism on the basis of their level of communication skills. Higashida’s only problem is “wiring” – mental and physical – and the social consequences.

How so-called “normal” people are able to string words together intelligibly in split seconds and then utter them at an incredibly rapid rate, and how others can understand such rapid strings of words, is a true miracle to autistic people, he explains. On reading his intelligent and clearly stated observations, the reader realizes that our “normal” communication is indeed a miracle. When we make a series of noises that we call “words” and rapidly direct them at another person, and when that other person understands what we are trying to communicate, it is truly a mystical experience – if one is paying attention to that fact. Unlike a toddler struggling to understand our word sounds and learning to speak, verbal communication is familiar to us and common, and we forget what a miracle it is. Higashida reminds us of this fact. We also forget that the hearer may hear something entirely different from the intended meaning of our words, which can lead to painful misunderstandings. Such experiences may help us remember that the miracle of communication should never be taken for granted. And when we reflect on the amazing fact of successful communication, it may also become clear to us that we are also able to communicate, if we are also good listeners and communicators, even beyond our own species. Higashida’s explanations open up our awareness of attributes of our world that we too often take for granted…and that we forget to cherish and use with great care.

Reading this book, which makes no reference to religion or spirituality, was a deeply spiritual experience for this reviewer. It enables a vision of “that of God,” as Quakers refer to that mystical spark of divinity, in someone who may otherwise seem to be an incomprehensible mystery and perhaps even an imbecile at the first, untutored assessment. Higashida reaches out through technology to share his common humanity with the reader despite his disability, so that a perceptive reader can sense the first possibilities of imagining what it is like – on some small level – to be Higashida, to be deeply autistic. Reflecting on such an experiment in empathy, the reader may also be able to enlarge that awareness to recognize that if we are able to reach out and relate to another who is as different as Naoki, surely we can relate to that same spark in others whom we may also otherwise have trouble understanding because of the other’s “race” or culture or language or accent or belief system or gender or sexual orientation. If we can find a spark of divinity in a jumping, flapping, autistic, Japanese child of thirteen, maybe we can find it in anyone and in any living being. Maybe even in ourselves.

But so long as we can learn to love ourselves, I’m not sure how much it matters whether we’re normal or autistic.

~Naoki Higashida