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April 27, 2014 4:34 PM   Subscribe

Two essays on death before time.
posted by IndigoJones (14 comments total) 8 users marked this as a favorite
 
Beautifully written essays on death "before one's time" - worth every minute of reading. It's helpful to read the deep reflections of those who really know how to write.
posted by Vibrissae at 6:44 PM on April 27, 2014


The first one struck me so much more than the second. Maybe because the first did not seem to have as much of an axe to grind about the unworthy and their touting of happiness?
posted by lesbiassparrow at 6:46 PM on April 27, 2014


And, because I think it's important to rage against the dying of the light and the fading of people's names: Gerry, I will always miss you. You were an awesome guy and it breaks my heart when I think of the world and your children exploring it and you not in it.
posted by lesbiassparrow at 6:49 PM on April 27, 2014


Wow. I thought the second one was kind of gross. People dying young is not a reason not to be happy, and it's weird to use a couple of dead people he didn't know very well to score points against Arianna Huffington. Plus, doesn't this kind of qualify as sexual harassment?:
I didn’t know Clarissa well, but whenever I met her at Speccie parties and pulled her leg about her teaching me strange Oriental sexual rituals she would crinkle up her face, blush, and laugh.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 7:10 PM on April 27, 2014 [2 favorites]


It is an odd mix of name-dropping, elegy, and grudge farming.
posted by thelonius at 7:14 PM on April 27, 2014 [5 favorites]


Oh, and here's a nice remembrance of Clarissa Tan by someone who actually knew her.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 7:16 PM on April 27, 2014


From the first link - No one close to me (except a friend when I was 15) has died young.
Here is that quite tragic story at the New English Review (incidentally containing another fulminant breast cancer death).
posted by unliteral at 7:23 PM on April 27, 2014


I guess I was put off by the fact he really didn't know either of these people. He's saying all this stuff that seems deep, but it's really so superficial. I almost find it offensive in a way. It's like when my friend died at 24 and my mom kept on trying to peer into her life and our friendship after she died and it felt so gross to me. She didn't know her even if they'd met many times. He's talking about death from a far, and trying to be all grand about it. It lacks a genuine understanding of loss.
posted by Aranquis at 7:26 PM on April 27, 2014 [4 favorites]


Theodore Dalrymple has lucid moments, but Taki Theodoracopulos is vile and his eponymous magazine is a disgrace. You can prove this for yourself, but as evidence I proffer the very first link I clicked on: How Uncanny Was My Valley? by Kathy Shaidle
posted by Joe in Australia at 1:07 AM on April 28, 2014 [2 favorites]


You are surprised the second essay is superficial? Really? Its TAKI's magazine, for fuck sake. Taki………..

This guy is an infamous, shallow, idiotic prick.

I started reading it, wondering why I had celebrity name drops right down to the "my good friend Bob Geldoff", an invocation of a prep school attended decades and decades ago, and gratuitous mentions of sexy talk that was probably one sided.

Then I looked at the masthead. Must do that first
posted by C.A.S. at 1:37 AM on April 28, 2014 [4 favorites]


This guy is an infamous, shallow, idiotic prick.

never heard of him before this
posted by thelonius at 2:02 AM on April 28, 2014


Wiki, check out the Controversies category

Argued FOR the fascist greek Golden Dawn movement, gave John Derbyshire a job after he proved too racist for the National Review, and here, check out (DM Link) this perfect shitstorm of assholery v assholery Daily Mail Charles Saatchi v Taki
posted by C.A.S. at 2:23 AM on April 28, 2014


There is something I dislike about the whole genre of edifying little essays about deaths. As Aranquis says, they lack a genuine understanding of loss. My father died when I was a child; it is not a spiritual lesson in disguise, it is a giant hole of loss and grief, that did great damage to me.

I read a piece by someone with cancer complaining of the similar need that their acquaintances seemed to have. They didn't want to hear anything that failed to conform to "everything happens for a reason" spiritual pablum. The brave fight! The triumph of the human spirit! Nothing about the loosening teeth and the toilets full of blood, please. Alcoholism? Tell us how you hit "rock bottom" and had a "moment of clarity", tell us about how you found a wise and benevolent AA sponsor the first day you were sober, and have been riding on an nonstop train of happiness and improvement ever since.

Perhaps this mentality is understandable, but people should have the good taste to not flaunt it in print.
posted by thelonius at 5:38 AM on April 28, 2014 [1 favorite]


his eponymous magazine is a disgrace.

But it does publish the "occasionally lucid Dalrymple", so perhaps not totally a disgrace.

never heard of him before this


Figured most in the blue had not, or otherwise had insuperable objections to the association. Which is why I made the post. Way I see it is, All Left and No Right makes Jack a Dull Boy. So I read all the way from Rolling Stone to TakiMag, at times nodding, at time rolling my eyes at both of them, and occasionally I come across things like this. (Came as a surprise to me that Taki was a friend to Geldof. Who'd have thought it?)
posted by IndigoJones at 3:42 PM on April 28, 2014


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