Christopher Hitchens, 1949-2011

Hitchens was perhaps today's most important public intellectual. Almost anything he published was worth consideration. But I was never a particularly big fan. He seemed to waver on so many issues, and his cancer, while sad, was a bit too public for me.

In any case, see the obituary at New York Times, "Polemicist Who Slashed All, Freely, With Wit." And also a reflection from Charles McGrath at the Times, "Spending An Afternoon in Christopher Hitchens’s Hospital-Room-Turned-Office."

And Joy McCann has the big roundup, "R.I.P. Christopher Hitchens." (Via Memeorandum).