Pinter was known for plays such as The Birthday Party and The Caretaker—and later in his career as a salon leftist with a reflexive and increasingly dated hostility to the United States.
The British writer—born of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe—died after a six-year bout of cancer, at the age of 78.
It was never entirely clear how much the Nobel prize for literature awarded in 2005 represented recognition of his contribution as a dramatist, sympathy for the playwright's long illness—or merely a collective rebuke by Europe's liberal intellectual establishment of the Bush administration's foreign policy of which Pinter was so noted a critic.
For a reverential analysis of Pinter's works, read the obituary in today's New York Times. For Pinter's own rather confused explanation of his political views, embedded here is a recent interview with Charlie Rose.
Writer John Leonard has died, according to 
After a long battle with cancer, science fiction's biggest crossover novelist Michael Crichton died today. Though the lanky Harvard graduate was most well known for his 1990 novel Jurassic Park, he leaves behind a sometimes controversial legacy of investigation into the most prominent scientific issues of our time. We review the highlights of his storied career:
Studs Terkel, Chicago's beloved author, interviewer, activist, radio host, and historian, died today at 96. Terkel's books Hard Times, Working, and The Good War are essential reading for students of American history in the first half of the 20th Century. He was a legendary storyteller and interviewer, and it's amazing to remember that not only did he publish his first book when he was already 55, but he then lived on to publish a dozen more, including one, P.S. Further Thoughts From a Lifetime of Listening, set to be released next month. "Take it easy, but take it." [
Fred Baron, the attorney who rebuilt the Texas Democratic party and became famous, late in life, for his unfortunate help in covering up the extramarital affair of former Senator John Edwards, died Thursday of cancer. He was 61. Baron made a fortune in asbestos litigation, and used the funds to found the Texas Democratic Trust in 2005, among countless other philanthropic causes. In the Edwards affair, Baron was revealed as the source of the supposed "hush money" keeping mistress Rielle Hunter 
Guillaume Depardieu, the estranged son of renowned actor Gérard, died today from complications relating to pneumonia at a hospital outside Paris. He was 37. An actor himself, Depardieu received acclaim early in his career for the 1995 film The Apprentices. He costarred with his father in several films, most notably Aime ton père (A Loving Father) in 2002. Though, dark clouds seemed to often occlude his successes. 
Joerg Haider, the extreme right wing Austrian politician who once said the Nazis had "an orderly employment policy" and referred to the concentration camps as "the punishment camps of National Socialism," died in a car crash last night. He was 58. "Haider was pronounced dead in a hospital shortly after his Volkswagen Phaeton veered off the road outside Klagenfurt in southern Austria and overturned several times after he successfully passed another car, police said. Authorities said an initial investigation showed no signs of foul play. At the time of his death, Haider was governor of the province of Carinthia and leader of the Alliance for the Future of Austria—a party he formed after breaking away from the far right Freedom Party in 2005."
Longtime ultimate fighter and former UFC middleweight champion Evan Tanner was 
Jerry Ford,* the (dapper!) fellow pictured here, is dead at 83.** Ford founded Ford Models, one of the leading agencies in the seventies and eighties that legitimized the industry and gained renown for discovering Lauren Hutton, Christie Brinkley, 
Someday, everyone reading this is going to die! And we should all get started on whatever we really want to do now, because the Grim Reaper could come to collect us at any minute. He's already come for Dave Freeman, co-author of 
Hiroaki "Rocky" Aoki, the wrestler and restaurateur who essentially introduced America to Japanese food with his Benihaha chain, died today in New York. He was 69. Aoki raised the money to start his first Benihana by driving an ice cream truck in Harlem, which is awesome. More recently, he's been known to New Yorkers through his children, model Devon and annoying scenester DJ Steve. He faced deportation in 2006, and you could do worse for an introduction to his colorful life than 
Stand-up comedian George Carlin, whose routine about forbidden words on the airwaves led to a key Supreme Court decision on government broadcast oversight, died of heart failure near Los Angeles. He was 71. Carlin had been admitted to the hospital earlier in the day with chest pains. He launched to fame in the 1960s as a straightlaced, suit-and-tie comedian appearing on programs like the Ed Sullivan Show as characters like the "hippie-dippie weatherman." By the 1970s, he was doing more risque material in long hair and jeans, and his performance of the routine "Seven Words You Can Never Say On Television" prompted an obscenity trial in Milwaukee, plus the Supreme Court fight, which arose from the airing of a similar routine on the radio in New York and an FCC fine. 
Artist 
The Semicolon died this week at the age of 417 from complications of irrelevancy and misuse. Semicolon was born in England in 1591 to Ben Jonson, the first notable writer to use them "systematically." The mark of punctuation dedicated its career to connecting independent clauses and indicating a closer relationship between the clauses than a period does. But mostly it just confused the shit out of English students everywhere. 
But not, erm, not the way the Joker died this winter. Industry rumor says that 
Conservative author, essayist, columnist, pundit, smug asshole, gadabout, secret spook, and blue-blooded creep 
Call off the search for Bobby Fischer. The man who totally schooled Commie chess player Boris Spassky in 1972 and later went on to mildly dislike America, the tribe of Moses and pretty much everything else in the world died in Iceland on yesterday. The nature of the illness that killed him is unknown. [
Steve Florio, the mustachioed colorful extravagant "pirate captain" ex-CEO and president of Conde Nast, died today from a heart attack. He was 58. Florio's tenure at Conde Nast spanned from the early 80's to 2004, when he stepped down (perhaps under duress!) as chief executive due to "heart problems." Over 25 years, Florio ran the New Yorker for a time and also GQ and saw circ numbers skyrocket (
Bobby Van, the Juilliard School dropout and owner of Bobby Van's Steakhouse in Bridgehampton, 
A 
Norman Mailer—Jewish pugilist, a writer equally at home with fiction and fact, a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, a lover and a hater of women and one of three founders of the Village Voice—died today. He was married repeatedly, and although he did stab his second wife, four more yet followed.
"He knew his colors and shapes, he learned more than 100 English words, and with his own brand of one-liners he established himself in television shows, scientific reports and news articles as perhaps the world's most famous talking bird. But last week Alex, an African gray parrot, died, apparently of natural causes, said Dr. Irene Pepperberg, a comparative psychologist at Brandeis University and Harvard who studied and worked with the parrot for most of his life and published reports of his progress in scientific journals. The parrot was 31." [
We thought "PEKEEP" might be some mysterious new free jazz expert that the Times was employing to write about the death of Max Roach, but it seems to just be some placeholder thing they forgot to take off. Anyway, we'll be referring to actual regular jazz expert Peter Keepnews as "PEKEEP" from now on. Oh: