Tani, Sanzan

Deaf-blind. Became deaf at 8 years of age, and blind in adulthood. Hungry for knowledge in his youth, he read voraciously and incessantly; when he grew up, he became an itinerant scholar, reading and questioning teachers everywhere, and became more knowledgeable about the great books than anyone else. The government recognized his brilliance and awarded him a teaching position. Even after he became blind also, Tani continued to teach, students writing in his palm and he answering them from his prodigious memory.