Aside from our personal losses, 2016 was the year when everyone apparently began to socially mediate the death of beloved others - famous people known universally, or to many. No other year - not even 2001 - since the new century began, has been so reviled by those living in it. Fuck you 2016 was a common refrain. The year almost became a running joke, coming to symbolise all that was mean, unfair, cruel and random about existence - it was the most existential year in decades. certainly, the death of so many talented, brilliant and creative persons underlined the compelling fact that WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE, SOONER OR LATER, no matter what. So we better get right with ourselves, the world, and decide how best to deal with the fate we have been thrown - stoicism advised.Claims that no more well-known people died than usual this year are basically besides the point (THOUGH the BBC now reports 50% more celebrities died this year than in any other on record) - in the sense that it did not feel this way to us, the popular common folk, mourning our losses and grave wounds. But more accurately, those of us born in the 1960s or later, for the first time, experienced the deaths of key figures of the 60s, 70s and 80s - icons in the least-exaggerated sense of the term.
It is true that Elvis, Monroe, Dean, Kennedy, Sinatra, Lennon, Heaney, Plath, Derrida, Kubrick, Ginsberg, Warhol, Lou Reed, Michael Jackson, for example, had died previously - but never all in one year. It took decades, once, it seemed, for the truly great, pivotal, or merely loved, to die in droves - not this year.
For instance, these 99 were culturally notable losses *(some of the figures are of course controversial):
1. AA GILL – sometimes cruel, well-respected British food and TV critic;
2. ABE VIGODA – popular TV and film actor perhaps best known for Barney Miller;
3. ALAN RICKMAN - versatile actor, unlikely sex symbol, and film villain in major
franchises, from Die Hard to Harry Potter, he memorably
"cancelled Christmas" in his bravura role in Robin Hood: Prince
of Thieves;
4. ALICE ARLEN – American screenwriter best-known for Silkwood;
5. AMBER RAYNE – American pornographic actress;
6. ANDREW GLAZE – American poet who often appeared in Poetry;
7. ANDRZEJ WAJDA - great Polish film director;
8. ANITA BROOKNER - Booker-winning novelist;
9. ANTON
YELCHIN – popular young actor famous
for reprising the role of Checkov in the Star Trek franchise;
10.
ANTONIN
SCALIA - notoriously
conservative Supreme Court Justice;
11.
ARNOLD
PALMER - one of golf's leading
players of all time;
12.
AV CHRISTIE –
American poet of note;
13.
BARBARA TURNER
– actress and screenwriter best-known for Pollock;
14.
BARRY HINES –
British novelist behind the novel that became the beloved film Kes;
15.
BERNARD
BERGONZI - important British
literary critic and scholar;
16.
BLACK –
singer-songwriter famous for the ‘Wonderful Life’ song;
17.
BRIAN BEDFORD
– charismatic British stage actor who did much of his best work in Canada;
18.
BRIGIT
PEGEEN KELLY - brilliant
American poet;
19.
BUCKWHEAT
ZYDECO - bandleader,
accordionist, made famous by working with Paul
Simon on the masterpiece Graceland;
20.
CARRIE
FISHER - the most iconic
character of the most beloved American film of all time - and a leading
feminist voice in Hollywood;
21.
CD WRIGHT –
major American poet;
22.
CHARMIAN
CARR - actress famed for her
role in The Sound of Music;
23.
DAME ZAHA HADID
– key post-modern architect;
24.
DARIO FO - Nobel winner for literature, major playwright;
25.
DAVID
BOWIE - the leading musician of
his generation, a genius and hugely influential on all music since 1970;
26.
DEBBIE
REYNOLDS - hugely popular
actress, who starred in the finest film musical of all time, Singin' In The
Rain;
27.
DG JONES –
significant Canadian poet and translator;
28.
EARL
HAMNER JR. - creator of beloved
and much-lampooned TV series The Waltons;
29.
EDWARD
ALBEE - arguably America's greatest
absurdist playwright;
30.
ELIE
WIESEL - Nobel laureate; famed
concentration camp survivor and public intellectual;
31.
FAROUK
SHOUSHA - Egyptian poet;
32.
FIDEL
CASTRO - one of the most famous revolutionary leaders of the 20th century;
33.
FLORENCE
HENDERSON - beloved TV icon from
The Brady Bunch;
34.
FRANCA
SOZZANI - influential editor of Vogue
(Italy) for decades;
35.
FRANK
ARMITAGE - important Disney
artist;
36.
FRANK SINATRA, JR - less-distinguished singer than his father;
37.
GARRY
SHANDLING - creator of The
Larry Sanders show - and one of the most influential comedians of the past 30
years;
38.
GARY
MARSHALL - creator of hit TV
shows of immense cultural clout, like Happy Days and Mork and
Mindy; and force behind Pretty Woman;
39.
GEOFFREY
HILL - considered by many the
major poet of the English language;
40.
GEORGE JONAS
– Canadian writer whose novel was the basis for Spielberg’s Munich;
41.
GEORGE KENNEDY
– one of the greatest of American character actors, often playing the heavy, he
tough guy, cop or soldier; famous for spoofing his roles in Airplane!;
42.
SIR GEORGE
MARTIN - the "fifth
Beatle" - the most influential and significant music producer since 1950;
43.
GEORGE
MICHAEL - one of the most
popular and best-selling musicians of the last 30 years;
44.
GLENN
FREY - key member of the major
American group The Eagles;
45.
GREG LAKE- seminal British prog-rock figure;
46.
GUY
HAMILTON - director of the greatest Bond film, Goldfinger;
47.
HARPER
LEE - quite possibly the most
beloved American author at the time of her death;
48.
HENRY
HEIMLICH - inventor of the
world-famous eponymous lifesaving technique;
49.
JACK ELROD –
cartoonist and creator of Mark Trail;
50.
JACK HAMMER –
singer-songwriter best-known for co-writing the great rock and roll anthem ‘Great
Balls of Fire’;
51.
JIM CLARK –
Oscar-winning British film editor;
52.
JIM
HARRISON - hard-living, popular
US novelist and poet, famous for Legends of the Fall;
53.
JOHN
GLENN - iconic US astronaut and
politician;
54.
JOHN
MONTAGUE - one of the greatest
of all Irish poets;
55.
JON
POLITO - character actor famed
for major roles in Coen Bro. films.
56.
KEITH
EMERSON - seminal British
prog-rock figure;
57.
SIR KEN
ADAM - most influential film set
designer of the modern era, creating the sets for Dr Stranglelove, and
the James Bond villain's lairs;
58.
KENNY
BAKER - famed for playing R2-D2
in Star Wars;
59.
LARRY DRAKE –
Emmy-winning American actor;
60.
LEONARD
COHEN - a key counter-culture
figure of the 60s, 70s and beyond - to many, the finest singer-songwriter never
to win the Nobel for Literature;
61.
MARGARET FORSTER – British novelist famed for Georgy Girl;
62.
MARION PATRICK JONES – vital Trinidadian writer and activist;
63.
MAURICE WHITE
– major soul singer-songwriter, with Earth,
Wind and Fire;
64.
MEL
HURTIG - progressive Canadian publisher;
65.
MICHAEL
CIMINO - major American
director, famous for The Deer Hunter.
66.
MICHEL TOURNIER
– major French writer;
67.
MUHAMMAD
ALI - a moral force, and
considered by many the finest athlete of modern times;
68.
NANCY
REAGAN – one of the most
influential, and controversial, of modern First Ladies;
69.
SIR NEVILLE
MARRINER - leading British
conductor;
70.
PETE BURNS –
infamous Dead Or Alive singer;
71.
Péter Esterhazy - major Hungarian writer;
72.
SIR PETER
MAXWELL DAVIES - the major British
composer of his generation;
73.
SIR PETER
SHAFFER - playwright and
screenwriter, responsible for modern classics Amadeus and Equus;
74.
PHIL
CHESS - co-founder of the
influential R and B, blues and rock label, Chess Records;
75.
PIERRE
BOULEZ - the major French
avant-garde composer of his generation; a great conductor;
76.
PJ MARA - Ireland's most famous political press secretary of
the modern Haughey era;
77.
PRINCE - the greatest and most prolific musical genius of
rock and pop of his 80s generation;
78.
PRINCE
BUSTER - the seminal Ska pioneer;
79.
RICHARD
ADAMS - author of the beloved
classic Watership Down, which has sold over 50 million copies;
80.
RICK
PARFITT - a great rock guitarist
and key member of top UK band the Status Quo;
81.
ROBERT
BATEMAN - songwriter of rock n
roll classics such as 'Please Mr Postman';
82.
ROBERT
STIGWOOD – influential musical
impresario, manager, and producer of Grease
and Saturday Night Fever;
83.
ROBERT
VAUGHN - priapic actor best
known for his iconic TV role in The Man from UNCLE;
84.
ROBIN
HARDY - director of possibly the greatest
British horror film The Wicker Man;
85.
ROD
TEMPERTON - British songwriter
of genius, who composed most of the best-selling seminal Thriller
album for Quincy Jones and Michael Jackson.
86.
RONNIE
CORBETT - one half of the
funniest comedy duo of their time, Ronnie was also a decent and
generous person in private;
87.
SHARON
JONES - beloved singer for the
soul revival group The Dap-Kings;
88.
SHIRLEY
JAFFE - abstract expressionist
artist;
89.
SYLVIA ANDERSON
– co-creator of Thunderbirds, and
voice of Lady Penelope;
90.
STANLEY MANN
– Canadian screenwriter who wrote or co-wrote scripts for popular films such as The Mouse That Roared, Firestarter, The Omen
2, Meteor and Eye of the Needle.
91.
TAMMY
GRIMES - award-winning US stage
actress;
92.
THORNTON DIAL
– African-American artist of note;
93.
UMBERTO
ECCO - one of the leading European
post-modern novelists of the age;
94.
VERA
RUBIN – major scientist who
discovered dark matter;
95.
VILMOS SZIGMOND
– cinematographer of classics like Easy
Rider and Close Encounters of The
Third Kind, pioneer of sunburst effect;
96.
WILLIAM
TREVOR - one of the best Irish
prose writers of the 20th century.
97.
WP
KINSELLA - leading Canadian
prose writer;
98.
YVES
BONNEFOY - major French poet;
99.
ZSA ZSA
GABOR - TV and film actress,
glamorous wit, comedienne, and world-famous divorcee.
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