Yesterday I came across the beautifully written Esquire profile of American film critic Roger Ebert.
I knew of Ebert through my love of classic Hollywood, but I hadn’t been aware that he lost his lower jaw — and his speech — to cancer.
The article packs a punch with its phrasing and imagery throughout, but I was particularly struck by this:
He lived his life through microphones.
But now everything he says must be written, either first on his laptop and funneled through speakers or, as he usually prefers, on some kind of paper. His new life is lived through Times New Roman and chicken scratch.
And through the vivid technicolor of his recollections, as, for example, in two recent posts on his Chicago Sun-Times blog about his London. The London of Jermyn Street and Dickensian landlords and meandering walks.
Such a pleasure to come across the blog, not just rich with film discussion but sharp observations on news and politics, interspersed with snapshots of a life well lived.
The paragraph excerpted above goes on:
So many words, so much writing — it’s like a kind of explosion is taking place on the second floor of his brownstone. It’s not the food or the drink he worries about anymore — I went thru a period when I obsessed about root beer + Steak + Shake malts, he writes on a blue Post-it note — but how many more words he can get out in the time he has left. In this living room, lined with thousands more books, words are the single most valuable thing in the world. They are gold bricks. Here idle chatter doesn’t exist; that would be like lighting cigars with hundred-dollar bills. Here there are only sentences and paragraphs divided by section breaks. Every word has meaning.
