On death

I know, kind of a heavy topic. And I'm not thirteen and I don't dress all in black. I left Emily Dickenson behind in college.

I got to thinking about the subject today in the context of my favorite authors. I seem to prefer them dead--probably because I don't have to worry about them saying something really dumb or publishing something really bad. Also, there's something spooky about reading words from a dead person. I'm a pretty firm believer that Art (the real thing with a capital "A") is about communication. So, the writings of dead people are the best shot at communicating with people across the generations.