By Stephen Fry
Almost as many words have been written about Christopher Hitchens since he died as he would write in a typical working week. He was one of very, very few people on earth whom I would have missed just as much had I never had the pleasure and fortune of knowing him. He lit fires in people’s minds. He was an educator.
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6 comments:
Mr. Fry, I agree wholeheartedly with your admiration of Mr. Hitchen's power of persuasion and his courage in saying what he thought was true, just like one of his heroes, Thomas Paine. Although I didn't agree with everything he espoused, he certainly "enlightened" me with just about everything he expressed.
My Fry, that was so eloquently put. I currently face put downs and derision simply because I am so very upset at his passing - and yet had never met the man. It's awful to be kicked when you're already down. Christopher left such a void. What a beautiful man he was.
I am embarrassed for feeling this bereft at the loss of someone I never met.
Stop all the clocks...
It seems a lot of us are feeling seriously mopey.
I think it has to do with how sad his final year was, how little we know about his last days, our regret that we couldn't stop him from lifestyle habits that did him in, our powerlessness to do anything for him who brought so much sanity into this insane planet and into our lives, our regret that we will never meet him in person and will never be able to tell him how much he meant to us.
If I, a complete stranger, am so choked up, I can imagine how devastated his family must be.
Well put, I thought that after his 3 near death experiences during his illness, I thought I was prepared for his eventual passing. But I was not. And yes, I cannot imagine the grief of his wife, and children.
Hitchens' "brilliance" and "mastery of language" pop up with predictable frequency, as of course they (or words to the same effect) do in Fry's hagiography.
Less, I think, than 10 years ago, I wrote down a Hitchens quotation, no doubt because I thought it good at the time:
He called (French President) Jacques Chirac a "balding Joan of Arc in drag".
And this on account of a political difference of mind!
Is such language (it does abound in Hitchens) really what Fry applauds as "style and wit"?
Oh, how I pity all sycophants!
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