I Just Read About That…

David Rakoff (1964-2012)

David Rakoff died Thursday from a resurgence of cancer.  For those unfamiliar with his work, think of darker, more cynical David Sedaris (did you think that was possible?).  The biggest difference between Rakoff and Sedaris is that Rakoff is Canadian.  And he is more of a world traveler.  I say this not really knowing anything about how much they actually traveled.  I mean, sure, Sedaris travels the world for book tours and such, but Rakoff actually lived in foreign lands.  Wait, you say, Sedaris lives in France.  Yes, but Rakoff lived in Tokyo (which automatically makes him more exotic).  And he actually knew Japanese (kind of) whereas Sedaris seems to have not learned any French in the years he has lived there–if his essays are to be believed.

All of this is by way of introduction to using Rakoff’s description of himself as a “New York writer” who also happened to be a “Canadian writer”, a “Jewish writer”, a “gay writer'” and an “East Asian Studies major who has forgotten most of his Japanese” writer.

I’ve only read one of Rakoff’s three books, Fraud.  And about that I said:

So, overall, I enjoyed these essays (some more than others).  But mostly what it did was make me want to read his next collection.  I feel like this was a sort of “early writings” from him.  There seemed to be progress through the book, as the essays were more thoughtful yet still humorous. And so one of these days I’ll check out his second (of three altogether) book, Don’t Get Too Comfortable.

Which I never did.

I did read a few smaller pieces by him, both of which I liked very much.  Rakoff also featured a lot on This American Life. His final contribution to the show was aired on July 27.  It’s a series of letters in which a man who believes he’s turning into a cockroach reaches out to a world-famous doctor for advice. Except the doctor will only respond in rhyme.  Can you guess who the participants are?  It’s quite funny–and yet, it is not all funny.  It’s much like his other stories–funny, funny, funny and then quite poignant.  It might even make you cry.

We can be thankful that his TAL archives are available on NPR.

And then there’s the other two books.  Obviously it doesn’t matter if I read them after he has died, but perhaps his final essays in his final book will be more poignant (they detail some end stages of his battle with cancer) when I read it…soon.

I’m sad that Rakoff won’t be bringing his dark humor to us anymore.  Of course now I fear that when I read his books I’ll be even sadder that he won’t be writing any more.

The silver lining is that This American Life says that his next book, a novel written in rhyme, will be out in 2013.