Monday, January 09, 2012
Rushdie on Hitch
Not very long after I posted about Christopher Hitchens, the man handed in his dinner pail (in Houston, Texas) leaving many like me who have not even met him strangely bereft. Love him or hate him, it should be said that the man was, when you stripped everything, a terrific stand-up comic (aren't we all, though the degree of skill–and success–varies?). Here's what Salman Rushdie has to say about the Hitch. The last sentence is something I think we can all "identify" with. While you're there, also read his last article–a delightful essay on the novelist who has been the unofficial spokesman for Christmas and childhood.
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2 comments:
Two things:
1. 62 is just waaay too young.
and
2. Salman Rushdie misquoted P.G. Wodehouse? What? Say it ain't so! Thanks to Hitchens for catching that. =)
Yes, 62 is too young. His essays are the ones I am gonna miss most. Strangely, but then maybe not, he was like Orwell in this, who I call the accessible intellectuals (as opposed to people like Shaw who "explains" his own play by novel-length introductions parts of which sometimes I can't seem to understand anyway).
Re. Wodehouse, genius will out. Hitchens, Rushdie, David Foster Wallace etc have affirmed. Stephen Fry said in his eulogy for Hitchens that both of them judged people by how much they liked Wodehouse! What a sensible gage!
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