Thursday, April 4, 2013

Roger Ebert RIP

Film critic Roger Ebert died today at the age of 70.  

I never read any of his movie reviews or his books.  I've always stayed away from music and movie reviews.  Not because I didn't think the writing wasn't any good.  No, no.  I'd just rather not be influenced either way before listening to a CD or seeing a film.  But that's hypocritical of me, because I do read book reviews before reading a book.   

What's sad, I think, is sometimes it takes an authors/writers death and the following media attention to draw attention to their work.  Not to devalue his writing (he won a Pulitzer), because he did have a strong following, especially after his cancer diagnosis and losing his ability to speak.  His perseverance is inspiring.  But I'd bet his books are going to sell well the next week or two.  As people who didn't read him before will want to know why this man's death was covered by so many media outlets.   They'll want to know what made him a great movie critic.   


UPDATE: A lot is being written about Ebert and his writing.  Here are some great excerpts from the Atlantic on what "Roger Ebert knew about writing."

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