esrosedotblog

I am a reader of obituaries.

Always, since I was a kid.

It is not a morbid curiosity. Rather, it is a way of reading biographies that will otherwise never see daylight or be printed.

I do have to admit that these days, I sneak a peek at the ages that people let go of the mortal coil. Or it let go of them.

I like to see the pictures when they were young. And old. Our local paper is notorious for publishing age old photos. An 80 year old (me?) who lives again in full youthful bloom.

For famous people, you may know that news organizations have obit writers. Their specialty is building files on a famous or infamous person in preparation for the inevitable day.

I believe the most credible, famous and interesting death writing happens in the New York Times.

And, just in time to match my own voracious attention to the death of Fidel Castro, there is an article written by all the people who were assigned to his obituary over the years.

Decades in the Making: Fidel Castro’s Obituary

The funny thing about Castro is that he outlived all his enemies and many of his friends. This is something I would like to emulate. But I know I won't have any control over that one.

The other day someone referred to their library of biographies as works of fiction. Of course.

Most of the obits I have read are hardly truthful.

In my case they would leave out certain parts like my trouble with alcohol. Nothing really about my early experiences as a closeted homosexual. And so on. Obit writers have a delicate and deft hand with scrubbing the history clean.

I have sometimes considered writing my own piece. Some people do this. I would put it all in. And try to make it funny. I have read funny obituaries. I want one.

In a way, this blog is my obituary. It will last forever or until "Blogger" decides that no entries for a long time means it can be scrubbed.

I am told that the internet content will have eternal life.

I won't be here to see it.

Oh. The sample up at the top for Walter White? That is the guy from Breaking Bad,the big miniseries on teevee.

It is a double fake. First, he is fictional and second it is a ruse to cover his disappearance into the show itself.

A twist. The obituary about someone who just wants to disappear. And is not really dead. But living a second life in Dubuque Iowa or some other obscure place.

A long time device for writers who want to cook up interesting lives for their characters. Drop them down in a new place and personna.

In fiction, this never works. Some private eye or an inquisitive relative or maybe a fortune hunter tracks them down. Exposure.

But that is another story.

Labels: obituary, writers

I have been reading Roger Angell in The New Yorker for years. It has been a puzzle to me how he could have been writing there when I started and is still at it. This might be a result of his being 93 today.

The one kind of article I didn't read much was his work on baseball. But when I did, I was fascinated and informed. I just wasn't that interested in baseball.

Now he is appreciated by none other than the bitch Maureen Dowd who I do not read as a matter of conviction. I hate her ass intensely. She calls Mr. Obama Barry and has an attitude that I really do not like at all. But I read this. Because it was about Angell.

Angell in the Outfield

He is being inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. A special award for writers of the game.

He is obviously thrilled. He did not set out to be a baseball writer and, in fact, he wrote about everything under the sun. But his baseball columns became popular and so he went for it along with his editor William Shawn. A fluke.

The only time I ever wanted to read about the game. He made it attractive and interesting.

Also, look how neat his desk is.

I am glad he is still alive and, apparently, kicking.

Good for him.

Labels: baseball, writers

It is hard to make yourself look good when you don't know fuck all about what you are doing.

But "looking good" doesn't seem to have bothered George Plimpton much.

He famously made a journalism project by becoming a rookie with the Detroit Lions football team and wrote a book about it. Paper Lion.

It was a great book. I read it almost immediately after it was published. And so did everyone else.

Then he went on to do all sorts of amateur things with hard bitten professionals. Even boxing.

This is all captured nicely in a film made to celebrate his spirit.

Plimpton: Starring George Plimpton as Himself

It is a pretty good film. Plimpton was a privileged rich boy who wasn't very good at sports but as part of the role was expected to play anyway. Participate, goddam it! Which he did.

His sense of humor served him well and this shows in his first and later books.

The film goes a fair way to demonstrate that he was an unusual participant in life. Gregarious. Willing to try things.

I enjoyed it.

It is easy to swallow. Nothing bad happens and, other than his own hurt pride, there is nothing to surmount either. Plimpton has a willing spirit which, when you think about it, is a life skill. He just was able to apply it in a number of spectacular ways. He was also rich enough, just from having money, that he could fool around.

I identified with this dilettantism. I tried a lot of stuff. I had to give a lot of stuff up. But I did the best I could and I got experience. Which they say is "the best teacher". "Them" again. "They" always have these sayings.

I wouldn't want to see this movie again but I enjoyed it a great deal and remember Mr. Plimpton fondly. He died at 71 in 2003. So he was a contemporary. Five years older than me.

Labels: sports, writers