Friday 22 December 2017

Some Musings on the Dead (2017)





If 2017 couldn’t (cross fingers) live up to the rampant terror of 2016, that’s only because nothing could. Muhammad Ali, David Bowie and Terry Wogan could only die once, after all. 2017, however, tried to follow this with quantity. In the days when I thought I’d have time to write my annual In Memoriam, the list had reached over 700 noteworthy people before I gave up the ghost. 


In particular this year the Reaper seems to have had it in for my childhood personally. So farewell Paddington, Cleggy, Batman, Siegfried Farnon, lots of Doctor Who alumni, etc. As I became ludicrously busy this year, I ran out of time to do my usual obits, and whilst the long read versions are the most popular, I felt it unkind and morbid to cherry pick a list. And, besides, anyone knows I could write 4000 words on why John Hurt was great. We know these things to be self-evident. A good 400-500 words on why we should spare a thought for, say, Jan Pruitt, matters just as much, if not more.