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I've just found out that Tom Disch committed suicide in his apartment on July 4th. He was found by a friend who lives a few blocks away.
I'm shocked, saddened, but not very surprised. Tom had been depressed for several years and was especially hit by the death of his longtime partner Charles Naylor. He also was very worried about being evicted from the rent controlled apartment he lived in for decades.
I last visited with him about a month ago, when I ran into him shopping at the Greenmarket across the street from where he lived (he rarely went out because he had trouble walking). He invited me up for cheese and bread which we bought together at the market and I visited for an hour or two. He seemed more optimistic about his work than he'd been for at least a year as he had three books/novellas coming out over the next year.
Tom wrote wonderful stories (I only read one or two of his novels but kept meaning to read more) and if you haven't ever read the collections Getting into Death or Fundamental Disch you need to find and read them.
Tom, as much as you were a bitter, sometimes mean curmudgeon--I'll miss you.
John Clute on Tom Disch
And possibly the best obituary by Elizabeth Hand on
Salon
I'm shocked, saddened, but not very surprised. Tom had been depressed for several years and was especially hit by the death of his longtime partner Charles Naylor. He also was very worried about being evicted from the rent controlled apartment he lived in for decades.
I last visited with him about a month ago, when I ran into him shopping at the Greenmarket across the street from where he lived (he rarely went out because he had trouble walking). He invited me up for cheese and bread which we bought together at the market and I visited for an hour or two. He seemed more optimistic about his work than he'd been for at least a year as he had three books/novellas coming out over the next year.
Tom wrote wonderful stories (I only read one or two of his novels but kept meaning to read more) and if you haven't ever read the collections Getting into Death or Fundamental Disch you need to find and read them.
Tom, as much as you were a bitter, sometimes mean curmudgeon--I'll miss you.
John Clute on Tom Disch
And possibly the best obituary by Elizabeth Hand on
Salon
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He was also a painter--I love some of the paintings in his apartment.
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But his living situation was dire --fucking NYU has been trying to evict him for a couple of years. His second home in the country was destroyed by flooding then mold. His health declining. Things have not been good for him.
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From:Just told Michael Swanwick
From:Re: Just told Michael Swanwick
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From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2008-07-07 11:01 pm (UTC) - ExpandRe: Just told Michael Swanwick
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From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2008-07-09 05:40 am (UTC) - ExpandIt wasn't NYU
From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2008-07-07 03:55 am (UTC) - ExpandRe: It wasn't NYU
From:Not NYU, just fyi
From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2008-07-07 06:28 pm (UTC) - ExpandRe: Not NYU, just fyi
From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2008-07-07 06:30 pm (UTC) - ExpandRe: Not NYU, just fyi
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I'll have to call my father and tell him.
Shit, what a year it's been.
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At any rate, it comes to mind that an attempt was made to reintroduce Disch with sexy trade paperbacks based on the Vintage resell of Dick, around the same time as Sturgeon, like ten years ago. It didn't seem to work, for Disch or Sturgeon.
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From: (Anonymous) - Date: 2008-07-07 03:54 am (UTC) - Expand(no subject)
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And then somebody gave me 334 to read when I was a teen, and I was hooked.
Damn.
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I'm very sorry to hear that he took his own life. There were times when he was looking for more interaction with readers and I tried to respond as much as I could, and it's hard now to not feel bad for not giving someone who gave me so much art and wonder more time.
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With the books coming out and so on ... it reminds me somehow of Phillip K. Dick's demise.
Love, C.
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My memory of Tom will always be colored by an afternoon that he and Stan Shaffer--a fellow Clarionite--spent at a junior college in New Jersey at a symposium on speculative literature. Stan had introduced me to to Tom, and he had a slight "don't embarrass me in front of my friend" air about him. So when the symposium was over and we were walking over the lawn--a series of immaculately groomed hills--and I put down my bag and books and lay down and rolled down the green, Stan was appalled. And then Tom, bless him forever, said "Oh, yes," handed his stuff to Stan, and rolled down the hill too. I think we went up and down that hill a few times, and Stan finally joined in.
I know Tom was depressed these last few years; I'm so happy to have this joyful recollection to pair with his extraordinary writing.
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From: (Anonymous)
Thomas Disch
Ann VanderMeer
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May you have peace in recompense to the terrible pain that killed you, Tom.
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