OPINION:
People die every day. In their thousands, in their millions and in a horrible variety of ways. We are forever being saddened, shocked and repulsed by the deaths we see and hear about. But only occasionally does a death really shake us, make us reconsider whether we actually understand anything, make us feel we are on shifting ground and that, in Auden’s words, “nothing now can come to any good”.
Such a time comes when we hear of a death that seems so unexpected, unnecessary and untimely; the death of a man who had been so funny and beloved and
