Biographies are one of the best ways to understand history. Thanks for all the fresh insights on familiar faces…

I was working in a bookstore in Puerto Rico when the Jonestown massacre occurred. What I remember most vividly is that less than a month later there was a book published, and maybe two about Jones and Jonestown and the massacre. I assumed that there were people preparing a manuscript but did not anticipate the unexpected end of the story. However, that “rush to be first” is not doubt a routine matter in so many situations involving big names or events.

So your anecdote about the call when Singer learned his hero was dead triggered my own memory.

— Singer writes that, with Hemingway only two hours dead, he felt like a prostitute “…a sort of ghoul feeding on the remains of a dead hero.” —

I think that nowadays there are writers and publishers who have no second thoughts about “whoring” if they can be first to cash a check on a dead celebrity. Hemingway himself famously said, “He who laughs all the way to the bank is crying inside.”

Keep up the good work.