David, I’m crushed to hear this sad news. Marshall was, exactly as you say, brilliant, witty, deeply and intensely thoughtful. He could be fun, too. A year ago at just this time, he was raising a martini glass in company with some of us at the SAA. I can hardly imagine his passing. I’ll miss him very much, and I join you in sorrow and reflection.
Judith
Judith H. Anderson
Chancellor's Professor
Department of English
Indiana University
1020 E. Kirkwood Ave.
Bloomington, IN 47405-7103
From: Sidney-Spenser Discussion List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of David Miller
Sent: Tuesday, March 29, 2011 3:50 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Marshall Grossman
Friends,
Marshall Grossman died this afternoon after losing a four-month battle with cancer.
If you knew him only by his work, and by the wit of his occasional contributions to this list, then you knew a lot. He was a brilliant critic. But those of us who knew him personally saw how the wit and brilliant mind were always in play. Marshall could talk to you about anything--politics, history, jazz, the more abstruse reaches of theory. He could make you laugh hard and think harder. His table talk at the Folger lives in legend.
To know him well enough was to see an underlying sweetness to his disposition that expressed itself mostly by indirection. He was an incredibly kind man beneath the sometimes sardonic, wise-guy persona. He was as good a friend as I have known.
Marshall was beloved by many who read this list, and will be deeply missed.
Sadly,
David
--
David Lee Miller
Carolina Distinguished Professor of English
and Comparative Literature
Director, Center for Digital Humanities
University of South Carolina
Columbia, SC 29208
(803) 777-4256
FAX 777-9064
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http://www.cas.sc.edu/engl/people/pages/miller.html