Mortality

Product Information

Christopher Hitchens began his memoir, “Hitch-22,” on a note of grim amusement at finding himself described in a British National Portrait Gallery publication as “the late Christopher Hitchens.

His unworldly fluency never deserted him, his commitment was passionate, and he never deserted his trade. Some of his friends didn’t know what to say, other than recounting “motivational” stories of people who had survived the disease. The great polemicist, essayist, conversationalist, provocateur, arguer, has done something extraordinary in this book.Of course, he eagerly pounced on the opportunity, only to have his chances of survival dashed by religious zealots.

More, it is an instigatory experience: it compels you to get involved more deeply with the world around and inside you. Who else feels Christopher Hitchens getting terminal throat cancer [sic] was God’s revenge for him using his voice to blaspheme Him? Hitchens’s powerful voice compels us to consider carefully the small measures by which we live every day and to cherish them.It’s even in obituaries for cancer losers, as if one might reasonably say of someone that they died after a long and brave struggle with mortality.