Dudley Clendinen was a sixty-six year old recovering alcoholic and reporter when he wrote the essay "The Good Short Life" in the New York Times Sunday Review. The essay was about how Clendinen planned on committing suicide in the near future. Although suicide is awful, I'm surprised that I actually found myself agreeing with his decision. Clendinen was suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (also known as ALS or Lou Gehrig's disease) and did not want to become a burden to his family because the disease has no cure. The purpose of Clendinen writing this essay was for adults to talk about death more openly and to explain to loved ones and fans of his why he wanted to kill himself. He explains his purpose by putting his situation into terms that most people can relate to. Clendinen said that the cost of keeping him alive is too much if he is just going to die anyways. He also stated that if he were to be kept alive by a machine, he'd be "maintained by feeding and waste tubes" which would leave him with zero quality of life (Brooks and Atwan 64). Other people can sympathize with him because most people want to die happy and leave their families with enough money to take care of themselves. The strategy of putting his situation into common terms makes me think that he did accomplish his purpose. I believe that he accomplished his purpose of trying to get adults to talk about death more by talking about death himself. According to the New York Times he said that
"we act
as if facing death weren’t one of life’s greatest, most absorbing thrills and
challenges...believe me it is" (McFadden). Unfortunately, Clendinen died
at the age of sixty-seven last year due to his disease. His daughter, Whitney, said it was not done by his own hand (McFadden).
Dudley Clendinen at age 66
Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times
Works Cited
Brooks, David, and Robert Atwan, eds. The Best American Essays 2012. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012. Print.
McFadden, Robert D. "Dudley Clendinen, Reporter and Editor, Dies at 67." The New
York Times. The New York Times Company, 31 May 2012. Web. 13 Aug. 2013.
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