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News & ArtsThursday, December 15, 2011
Death Christopher Hitchens
Posted by Dan Savage on Thu, Dec 15, 2011 at 9:20 PM
Dead.
UPDATE: Go read Christopher Buckley's heartbreaking eulogy for his friend Hitchens, just posted at the New Yorker.
1
My condolences to his family and friends. I'm sure his passing has left a hole in their lives. I enjoyed his writing.
2
I think the best people are not those who you always agree with (I certainly disagreed with Hitchens plenty, for example his stance on the war in Iraq) but those who's arguments even on topics you disagree on make you think. I never came away from anything he wrote without a lot to think about. The drunken curmudgeon will be sorely missed.
3
It amazes me he would have the impeccable timing to die on the very day the government declared the Iraq war officially over. Hitch's announcement that he had decided to back the idea to invade Iraq after 9/11 was a tremendously influential move that softened so many who might have opposed the invasion. He came to properly regret it, but never the friendship with certain neocons whose enthusiasm had persuaded him. Say what you will about Hitch, he was a man who adored his friends.
8
Always found him worth reading or listening to, even when I disagreed with him. He was a formidable debater. I watched him once dismantle an utterly outclassed Dinesh D'Souza, Hitch employing considerable courtesy and urbanity and even (I don't think I imagined this) a certain amount of personal goodwill.
9
I am really sad about this. Just -- fuck. I've been following his progress, partly because a friend of mine (also brilliant, eloquent, and deeply caring) was struggling with lung cancer at the same time. My friend died two weeks ago, and now Hitchens is gone, too.
So, so sad right now.
So, so sad right now.
11
While I, too, didn't agree with everything he said, I agreed far more often than I disagreed, and that is rare.
A rare wit and a great man. He will be missed.
A rare wit and a great man. He will be missed.
12
It's a terrible shame :/ I'll miss seeing him on all the talk shows - Hitch was always made for an interesting show.
17
I read an article about him a while back and thought, for some reason, that he was already dead. Hearing that I was mistaken was a strange kind of relief. I was wrong, he was still going somehow and...
Damn. I think I'll go buy one of his books tomorrow and spend the weekend getting reacquainted.
Damn. I think I'll go buy one of his books tomorrow and spend the weekend getting reacquainted.
19
I just blew up at someone on twitter who said "God's wrath struck him dead." I'm really not looking forward to the commentary by the Pat Robertsons of the world.
20
There's a nice piece posted by Christopher Buckley in The New Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/ne…
21
Woah! :( I always saw him as a sort of Socrates figure, a gadfly that harasses and questions our lazily held assumptions. Your contrarian ass will be missed!
23
The only writer who could regularly send me scurrying off to find the dictionary. My favourite was when he was on tv after Falwell died and said that he hoped he was wrong about there being no hell, so Falwell could go rot there. The look on everyone else's faces was priceless.
24
We're all the lesser for Hitch's passing, but that Buckley kid is really such a name-dropping asshole
26
What Noadi said @2, though I remember thinking (after watching Hitch on Face the Nation or something), that he laid out the most reasonable case to go to war against Iraq that I'd ever heard, and that had W & co. used his talking points, the invasion would have had far more support than it did.
I'm very sad to know that the wisdom and wit that he's already shared is all we'll have. If only we could have had him around for another 30 years.
I'm very sad to know that the wisdom and wit that he's already shared is all we'll have. If only we could have had him around for another 30 years.
27
RIP. A thinker with a platform, so rare when what we often have are pretty faces with empty heads that have a platform. He will be missed.
29
Intelligent people who you always agree with, no matter how reassuring, are not as interesting or as important as intelligent people who you often disagree with.
The latter challenge your views with something other than mere disgust or disbelief, but with actual thoughts, thoughts coming from a mind one can respect and admire. Thoughts that will be part of the factors that shape one's own journey.
Mr Hitchens, I so often disagreed with you. I would give a lot right now to still have many opportunities for disagreeing with you again.
The latter challenge your views with something other than mere disgust or disbelief, but with actual thoughts, thoughts coming from a mind one can respect and admire. Thoughts that will be part of the factors that shape one's own journey.
Mr Hitchens, I so often disagreed with you. I would give a lot right now to still have many opportunities for disagreeing with you again.
31
Gotta' love the Stranger. A reformed Hitchens disagrees with nearly every part of the agenda (Iraq, Obama, Clinton, Institutional Liberalism, Anti-Intellectualism, Socialism et al) -- and the Stranger picks one thing: Catholics, for the representative video.
Awesome Stranger. Awesome.
Hitch. You were a helluva' ball buster. A oratorial assassin. An intellectual giant. May you enjoy the Lord's forgiveness and grace. I suspect you're buying the first round of Scotch with for Mother Theresa this evening. Cheers.
Gotta' love the Stranger. A reformed Hitchens disagrees with nearly every part of the agenda (Iraq, Obama, Clinton, Institutional Liberalism, Anti-Intellectualism, Socialism et al) -- and the Stranger picks one thing: Catholics, for the representative video.
Awesome Stranger. Awesome.
Hitch. You were a helluva' ball buster. A oratorial assassin. An intellectual giant. May you enjoy the Lord's forgiveness and grace. I suspect you're buying the first round of Scotch with for Mother Theresa this evening. Cheers.
33
Why didn't the Stranger run this anti-Feminism video (particularly at :35)?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpA7pfR0F…
Or, Hitchen's expressing his anti-abortion/pro-life stand (and at 2:15, expllcitly removing the 'right of choice" from women:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8HhTKzmv…
(I have this hollow, sinking feeling the Hitchens, post mortem, is a actually turning-out to be a disappointing surprise to the Stranger.)
Why didn't the Stranger run this anti-Feminism video (particularly at :35)?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpA7pfR0F…
Or, Hitchen's expressing his anti-abortion/pro-life stand (and at 2:15, expllcitly removing the 'right of choice" from women:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8HhTKzmv…
(I have this hollow, sinking feeling the Hitchens, post mortem, is a actually turning-out to be a disappointing surprise to the Stranger.)
35
Hitch was a favorite of the troll's.
He is probably gaining new insights
into the nature of 'god' right about now......
He is probably gaining new insights
into the nature of 'god' right about now......
37
Sad day..humanities collective IQ just went down.
BTW, Hitchens mentioned in his book "God is not Great" to beware of those who will claim he made a last second conversion to religious belief. Those claims will be false.
BTW, Hitchens mentioned in his book "God is not Great" to beware of those who will claim he made a last second conversion to religious belief. Those claims will be false.
38
And a recommendation for your Christmas viewing needs: Rent "The Four Horsemen" from Netflix. It's a two hour (?) discussion featuring Hitchens, Hawkins, Harris and another gent (I forget the name). Very informal, wonderful and enlightening.
39
It's not just the loss of a great writer, of one of the best keepers of the English language. No one could agree with all of his strongly asserted beliefs. But his prose, logic, and erudition were unmatched. I'm not a fanboy for atheism, or most of his points, but I will personally miss this genius of discourse and literacy, and find it no accident that he's gone the same week we lose the remaining civil liberties, and the internet as well.
40
The New Yorker piece reminded me of one of the many quotable lines from Hitch-22: bemoaning the depravation of age, Hitchens noted that his looks had degraded to the point where only women were willing to go to bed with him.
41
I have some reading to do. Always loved hearing him speak. Great language, great intellect and always challenging.
42
I grieve for his family and for the years of insight, wit and beautiful writing he could have still given the world. I will rejoice in the fact that he lives on in his writing and spoken word, as well as in the minds of people who he forced to think, to re-examine, to appreciate a good challenge more than a mere pander.
@25 Johnnie Walker Black-label. I just had a tooth out so sloshing whiskey is probably a bad idea, but raise a glass in his honor if you can.
@25 Johnnie Walker Black-label. I just had a tooth out so sloshing whiskey is probably a bad idea, but raise a glass in his honor if you can.
43
Hitchens did not sacralize the dead or recently dead, and never shrunk from critiquing them, so, while I agree that he was an amazing writer in many ways and I read him kind of compulsively, stuff like this needs to be said (from the New Yorker comment blog):
'I had little time for Hitchens given what a polemicist he was, notwithstanding his outstanding abilities as a writer and reporter. But what became clear to me while reading the article above was how often the issue revolved around himself, rather than the issue in question. This was illustrated best in the example given about the funeral of WFB when Kissinger got up to speak; while Hitchens felt it necessary to recuse himself from listening to the former Secretary of State, it occurred to me that that was entirely inappropriate: the funeral was about WFB, not about was Hitchens thought of the eulogist(s). Hitchens was too often the story, and I consider that a significant failing. May he rest in peace.'
'I had little time for Hitchens given what a polemicist he was, notwithstanding his outstanding abilities as a writer and reporter. But what became clear to me while reading the article above was how often the issue revolved around himself, rather than the issue in question. This was illustrated best in the example given about the funeral of WFB when Kissinger got up to speak; while Hitchens felt it necessary to recuse himself from listening to the former Secretary of State, it occurred to me that that was entirely inappropriate: the funeral was about WFB, not about was Hitchens thought of the eulogist(s). Hitchens was too often the story, and I consider that a significant failing. May he rest in peace.'
44
@43 I understand his reaction to Kissinger. I was alive when Kissinger was Secretary of State. I wouldn't want to be in his presence under any circumstance either. I would also have walked out on Robert McNamara. And nobody is claiming Hitchens was without fault. But he was a fearless intellelect and that may be what I admired most.
45
Thanks for posting that debate video, Dan. Part 2 of 2 is selectable after that one finishes. That appearance is a simply wonderful example of the sheer power of Hitch's barbed tongue. His diatribe against the church was devastating, intellectually impeccable, concise, and overwhelming.
He was a powerful writer, with strong opinions and a brilliant mind. It didn't always make him right, but it was a force to contend with. The world is a bit blander without him in it.
He was a powerful writer, with strong opinions and a brilliant mind. It didn't always make him right, but it was a force to contend with. The world is a bit blander without him in it.
46
I disagree with virtually everything Hitchens wrote or said, and how he wrote or said it. Nevertheless, I admire his intellect and his conviction. Those will be missed.
47
RIP Hitchens.
Bunny trail here, but after watching Hitchens, I clicked on the link to Stephen Fry's speech, in which he also discusses the church's treatment of gays.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pla…
"For me to be called a pervert by these extraordinarily sexually disfunctional people ..."
Bunny trail here, but after watching Hitchens, I clicked on the link to Stephen Fry's speech, in which he also discusses the church's treatment of gays.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pla…
"For me to be called a pervert by these extraordinarily sexually disfunctional people ..."
48
His death is not only the passing of a giant, but the hallmark of the passing of a way of thinking about the world. Today is so dominated by shiny, disposable, and hollow thinking and we'll all miss his passionate defense of reason.
49
Voice of reason? Intellectual assassin? Giant? Dear lord, it really is true that an English accent makes Americans into credulous idiots.
De mortuis nil nisi bonum.
De mortuis nil nisi bonum.
51
RIP Mr Hitchens, and thank you for all your good work.
Your voice will be sorely missed, but your legacy will stand forever.
Your voice will be sorely missed, but your legacy will stand forever.
53
It's true, Hitchens had a very healthy self-regard, and it's also true that after reading many of his pieces you would be dazzled, but come to realize afterwards that you had learned a great deal about Hitch's erudition but not that much about his subject. For instance, his takedowns of Mr. Clinton always seemed to be more about his own dissatisfaction with how the left of their common youth had turned out.
But he was an exemplar of one of the great things that British writers do better than anyone else on the planet, which is argue persuasively from a position of extraordinarily wide familiarity with literature and the English language. A great deal of it he learned at the feet of the master, his best friend's father, Kingsley Amis; but Hitch brought plenty of his own to the table.
For me his finest moment was the attack on Mother Theresa, one of the great frauds of all time; while most people only seem to remember the audacity of it, he was not just randomly abusive; he had the facts. She raised hundreds of millions of dollars to run appalling "charities" that spend thousands, and where the rest of it we will never know. He loved goring sacred cows (if I was one-one-thousandth the writer Hitch was I'd have a better metaphor than that at hand) like Jerry Falwell. When you agreed with him, it was delicious; when not, infuriating, because there was little you could come back at him with.
I think Hitch is the best essayist of our time, possibly exceeded only by Clive James or his fellow American exile Jonathan Raban. He was a legitimate "type", a character of a sort that America is too stupid to produce on its own anymore but still has the capacity to blossom forth in immigrants. He will be hugely missed.
But he was an exemplar of one of the great things that British writers do better than anyone else on the planet, which is argue persuasively from a position of extraordinarily wide familiarity with literature and the English language. A great deal of it he learned at the feet of the master, his best friend's father, Kingsley Amis; but Hitch brought plenty of his own to the table.
For me his finest moment was the attack on Mother Theresa, one of the great frauds of all time; while most people only seem to remember the audacity of it, he was not just randomly abusive; he had the facts. She raised hundreds of millions of dollars to run appalling "charities" that spend thousands, and where the rest of it we will never know. He loved goring sacred cows (if I was one-one-thousandth the writer Hitch was I'd have a better metaphor than that at hand) like Jerry Falwell. When you agreed with him, it was delicious; when not, infuriating, because there was little you could come back at him with.
I think Hitch is the best essayist of our time, possibly exceeded only by Clive James or his fellow American exile Jonathan Raban. He was a legitimate "type", a character of a sort that America is too stupid to produce on its own anymore but still has the capacity to blossom forth in immigrants. He will be hugely missed.
54
@53 It was that bit about "Mother" Theresa that won my heart. It was a take down so audacious it took my breath away. Your right about us Americans. We can be such sheep. But when somebody comes along and takes the legs off a sacred altar that you just know in your heart is a fraud, it's truly inspiring. And it's a reminder of what free speech originally meant.
55
His attack on Mother Theresa was also one of the things that made me more of a skeptic than I had been before.
Despite my overall disapproval of the Catholic church I always held to the idea that at least there was some good to be inspired by it, such as Mother Theresa.
Then I read what Hitchens had to say about her and I walked away thinking, "What a fucking bitch!!!"
I am not ashamed to say that getting me to change my attitudes on anything is not easy. That he had me do a complete 180 is a rare thing. And it led me to think that if I had been so wrong about that Mother, Theresa, what else was I wrong about. What else was I just accepting just because I have always been told it was so? It was then that I started to really examine things and not just accept them because it was the common thought.
I certainly didn't agree with everything he said, not the least of which was his support of the Iraq invasion. But I have to give him a large part of the credit for making me open up my eyes.
Despite my overall disapproval of the Catholic church I always held to the idea that at least there was some good to be inspired by it, such as Mother Theresa.
Then I read what Hitchens had to say about her and I walked away thinking, "What a fucking bitch!!!"
I am not ashamed to say that getting me to change my attitudes on anything is not easy. That he had me do a complete 180 is a rare thing. And it led me to think that if I had been so wrong about that Mother, Theresa, what else was I wrong about. What else was I just accepting just because I have always been told it was so? It was then that I started to really examine things and not just accept them because it was the common thought.
I certainly didn't agree with everything he said, not the least of which was his support of the Iraq invasion. But I have to give him a large part of the credit for making me open up my eyes.
57
@33, He was absolutely a giant asshole. He said all kinds of drunken, inflammatory bullshit. He attacked everybody. But he did it eloquently, thoroughly, and with a thought-out integrity, and he did it when nobody else dared to. He was wrong a lot, but he was also right about things most people don't have the courage to be right about. He was terribly flawed and human and bitter and spiteful and damned if that doesn't make him a better man in my eyes than most "saints."
Something Awful, of all places, actually has what I consider to be the best obituary for him I've seen, entitled "Insufferable Piece of Crap Will Be Dearly Missed".
Something Awful, of all places, actually has what I consider to be the best obituary for him I've seen, entitled "Insufferable Piece of Crap Will Be Dearly Missed".
58
@38 The Four Horsemen (of so-called New Atheism) were/are Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Daniel Dennett. (Stephen Pinker, Lawrence Krauss and Jerry Coyne might be considered adjunct Horsemen, if a person is voraciously hungry on the topic).
Ah, Hitch. A brilliant essayist and speaker, with a seemingly endless reservoir of quotations and allusions to bolster his own, formidable ability to turn a phrase. He really does belong with his beloved George Orwell as arguably one of the two greatest English language essayists of the past century.
Condolences to his wife, Carol Blue, his three children, and to his many dear friends, including Martin Amis, Salman Rushdie, Julian Barnes, and Chris Buckley.
Ah, Hitch. A brilliant essayist and speaker, with a seemingly endless reservoir of quotations and allusions to bolster his own, formidable ability to turn a phrase. He really does belong with his beloved George Orwell as arguably one of the two greatest English language essayists of the past century.
Condolences to his wife, Carol Blue, his three children, and to his many dear friends, including Martin Amis, Salman Rushdie, Julian Barnes, and Chris Buckley.
59
He was a flaming asshole, a petulant egotistical dick, but dammit, he was an intelligent and interesting petulant egotistical flaming asshole. I'll miss his drunken rants.
61
@57(balderdash), I've just read the obituary you linked to in your comment. Believe it or not, it moved me to tears. Damn.
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