Sharing George R.R. Martin’s thoughts about the many deaths of 2016 has some obvious reasons behind it. He’s the mind behind Game of Thrones and has the reputation as being a creator that seems to relish in killing fan favorite characters. It’s one of those things that’s sure to grab an eye, especially when discussing a year that saw so many famous names appear in obituaries.
But the true reason to share his thoughts stems from those we lost on Tuesday: Carrie Fisher and Richard Adams, the author of Watership Down. Fisher has received praise from all across the entertainment world, which Martin notes in his latest post on his personal Live Journal, but it’s Adams that takes the spotlight for him.
In what is hopefully a final sad note on the year, Martin discusses his personal regret at never meeting Adams before his passing while sharing some praise for the late writer’s work away from Watership Down:
Adams was a wonderful writer. Yes, WATERSHIP DOWN was his masterpiece, but it was by no means his only great book. He wrote two terrific epic fantasies with human characters, SHARDIK and MAIA, both of which I think are criminally underrated, as well as an erotic ghost story, THE GIRL ON A SWING. His other “animal book,” THE PLAGUE DOGS, also has some wonderful sections… though it is such a dark, depressing, angry, gut-punch of a novel that I can’t say I ‘enjoyed’ it.
Adams was not ‘one of us,’ in the sense that he was never a convention-goer or part of our genre fantasy community, which may be why he was never honored with a life achievement award by the World Fantasy Convention. Nonetheless, he deserved one. I’ve been suggesting him for that honor for at least twenty years… in part because I wanted to meet him. Now I never will. That’s sad (though not as sad as PLAGUE DOGS).
He concludes the post by asking for this “wretched year” to come to an end. It’s something many have said or thought in recent weeks, I’m sure.
(Via George R.R. Martin)
