The Violet Hour

A well-researched book about how some well-known authors looked at their impending death. For most, Roiphe was able to interview intimates of the subjects or read diaries and letters that showed their thoughts on this subject. For some, we glean their thoughts and beliefs from their writings. Roiphe offers a prologue in which she explains how she looked at death as a child and how the subject has haunted her, which I found to be one of the more interesting pieces. I'm one of those people who want to know what you are experiencing as you are going through the process of dying. This was not that book; however, it was a fascinating peek into Susan Sontag, Sigmund Freud, John Updike, Dylan Thomas, and Maurice Sendak. In the end, we are all human.

I don't worry about death. I don't think about death. I don't care about death.

Nevertheless, this book is a brilliant book. Whether you care about death or not, whether you care about writers or not, this book will set your little mind a-spinning about life and, yes, death, and meaning and purpose, and love and hate, and all the important things. It's thoroughly researched, full of all the little details and stories that delight and reveal, and it's beautifully written, in solid little chunks, almost like poems.