The Good Short Life - Dudley Clendinen TOW #1

Dudley Clendinen, reporter and editor for The St. Petersburg Times, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Baltimore Sun, and The New York Times, died at 67 on   May 30, 2012. However, it was neither his life nor his jobs that defined him, but his death. Clendinen died from ALS or more commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. In his essay he discusses the choice he made to not to get treatment to extend his life and his announcement to end his life before “Lou”, as he commonly called his disease, completely took over. When writing this essay, Clendinen was targeting all Americans, challenging them, to talk openly about dying. His purpose was to show his audience that dying can be just as eventful as living, and discussing it should not be hidden out of fear. Clendinen writes,  “We act as if facing death weren’t one of life’s greatest most absorbing thrills and challenges. Believe me, it is. This is not dull” (64). Hear he uses irony to help achieve his purpose. explains how death is a thrill and a challenge, which is what life is supposed to be. Life is supposed to be exciting but more often then not it is uneventful, because we choose to play things safe, but, ironically, when you know you are dying your dying days can be just as exhilarating.  So why not talk about it? “I don’t worry about fatty foods anymore. I don’t worry about having enough money to grow old. I’m not going to grow old” (66). Clendinen uses syntax to persuade the reader. The use of short sentences exaggerates the seriousness of what he is saying. His dying has allowed him to stop worrying about the superficial things that life forces you to. Allowing death, to give him the greatest lesson life can offer. Dudley Clendinen wants his audience to open a dialogue on dying. Although I found Clendinen’s article very moving, I did not feel like he achieved his purpose in his writing. I felt his writing about how he would kill himself before his disease got bad, distracted me as a reader.