sucks.
More significantly, though, Kurt Vonnegut died. This is depressing. It seems that there is a whole group of terrific mid/late twentieth century writers who are all either dying or putting out a last novel or two before they die.... It'll be interesting to see who carries the proverbial torch. Will it be Jonathan Safran Foer, Zadie Smith (I know...she's British and female!), David Foster Wallace, etc.? Or will it be a bunch of writers we don't know anything about yet? I suggest that writers in the great American tradition will become less and less distinguishable from their international counterparts as America becomes less and less the international force it so prides itself with being at this point. We'll see. Let's just hope someone's writing something spectacular out there...anywhere.
