Daniel Tammet

Daniel Tammet
Tammet speaking in 2016 (Montréal)
Born	Daniel Paul Corney (1979-01-31) 31 January 1979 (age 38) London, England
Occupation	Writer, educator
Website	DanielTammet.net

Daniel Tammet FRSA (born 31 January 1979) is an English writer, essayist, translator, and autistic savant. His 2006 memoir, Born on a Blue Day, about his life with Asperger syndrome and savant syndrome, was named a "Best Book for Young Adults" in 2008 by the American Library Association Young Adult Library Services magazine. His second book, Embracing the Wide Sky, was one of France's best-selling books of 2009. His third book, Thinking in Numbers, was published on 16 August 2012 by Hodder & Stoughton in the United Kingdom and on 30 July 2013 by Little, Brown and Company in the United States and Canada. Mishenka, his first novel, was published in France and Quebec in 2016. His books have been published in 20 languages. He was elected in 2012 to serve as a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Tammet was born Daniel Paul Corney and raised in Barking, East London, England, as the eldest of nine children. He suffered epileptic seizures as a young child, which he subsequently outgrew following medical treatment.

He participated twice in the World Memory Championships in London under his birth name, placing 11th in 1999 and 4th in 2000.

He changed his birth name by deed poll because "it didn't fit with the way he saw himself." He took the word Tammet from the Estonian for 'oak tree'.