Morre, aos 62 anos, o escritor Christopher Hitchens

Mais conhecido por sua obra ateísta God is Not Great, Christopher Hitchens foi um jornalista e escritor que se destacou por seus escritos extremamente críticos. Ex-comunista, colaborador de vários meios de comunicação, como a Vanity Fair, da mesma forma como realizava críticas ferozes e mordazes contra personalidades tão diversas como Clinton, Kissinger, Madre Tereza, Saddam Hussein, Michael Moore, Kim Jong II, Sarah Palin e Príncipe Charles, escrevia inteligentes e elogiosos ensaios sobre Thomas Paine, Jefferson e George Orwell.
Como seus amigos Martin Amis, Ian McEwan e Salman Rushdie, escrevia com enorme talento literário.
Após saberem da doença de Hitcthens (câncer no esôfago), alguns inimigos religiosos chegaram a insinuar que a doença seria uma manifestação divina pelo que escreveu em seu famoso livro, uma espécie de "retribuição". Sobre isso, Hitchens escreveu o seguinte: "The vengeful deity has a sadly depleted arsenal if all he can think of is exactly the cancer that my age and former ‘lifestyle’ would suggest that I got. Why cancer at all? Almost all men get cancer of the prostate if they live long enough: it’s an undignified thing but quite evenly distributed among saints and sinners, believers and unbelievers. If you maintain that god awards the appropriate cancers, you must also account for the numbers of infants who contract leukemia. Devout persons have died young and in pain. Bertrand Russell and Voltaire, by contrast, remained spry until the end, as many psychopathic criminals and tyrants have also done. These visitations, then, seem awfully random. While my so far uncancerous throat, let me rush to assure my Christian correspondent above, is not at all the only organ with which I have blasphemed … And even if my voice goes before I do, I shall continue to write polemics against religious delusions, at least until it’s hello darkness my old friend. In which case, why not cancer of the brain? As a terrified, half-aware imbecile, I might even scream for a priest at the close of business, though I hereby state while I am still lucid that the entity thus humiliating itself would not in fact be “me.” (Bear this in mind, in case of any later rumors or fabrications.)”
Perguntado se havia arrependimento em sua vida regada a festas, jantares, bebidas alcoólicas e cigarros, respondeu: "Writing is what’s important to me, and anything that helps me do that — or enhances and prolongs and deepens and sometimes intensifies argument and conversation — is worth it to me.” E que era “impossible for me to imagine having my life without going to those parties, without having those late nights, without that second bottle".
A respeito da morte de Christopher Hitchens, um dos mais talentosos escritores de nosso tempo, acompanhamos as palavras de Salman Rushdie: "Goodbye, my beloved friend. A great voice falls silent. A great heart stops."