Twenty-three minus one

Robert Anton Wilson
1932-2007
Philosopher

I knew he had been sick unto death, but the news of his actual death has me sad. I know it's not what he would have wanted, given his last public words from five days ago, but there you are.

Various medical authorities swarm in and out of here predicting I have between two days and two months to live. I think they are guessing. I remain cheerful and unimpressed. I look forward without dogmatic optimism but without dread. I love you all and I deeply implore you to keep the lasagna flying.

Please pardon my levity, I don't see how to take death seriously. It seems absurd.

He was a truly radical thinker—striking at the root of things. His silly, strange little book Prometheus Rising, about the functioning of the mind, so changed the way I thought about the way I think that ... well ... It Changed My Life. And he named me a True Pope, once. Honest.

R U Sirius has a good little eulogy.

He also had a razor sharp wit that he skillfully aimed at those who abuse power and wealth. And he was a delightful story teller, whose love of language was evidenced not only by his own novels, but by his ability to quote virtually everything James Joyce and Ezra Pound ever wrote ... backwards, while explaining what evolutionary level of primate behavior the author was elucidating.

He is survived by his wife, a badly-designed website full of treasures, and about a couple of dozen books that just might change your life.