“And then the dreams break into a million tiny pieces. The dream dies. Which leaves you with a choice: you can settle for reality, or you can go off, like a fool, and dream another dream.”
It took me a while to post this round-up, simply because I didn’t want to believe it. Yesterday, at work (on Twitter) I’d seen the news from Liz Smith and then the furor of posts that said, no Norah Ephron was NOT dead. I, like most people that adored her work and admired her, breathed deep and were glad it was just a rumor. Then, an hour later, I saw that while she was not dead, death was imminent. I refused to believe it, even though the statement came from a trusted source. On the long bus ride home, I put it out of my mind only to arrive home, open my laptop and see the news from my friend Darlene Chan, that she died. I couldn’t process it.
Reading makes me feel I’ve accomplished something, learned something, become a better person. … Reading is bliss.”
– Nora Ephron
I didn’t know Norah Ephron, but I loved her. Her movies and her books spoke to me of a brilliant, sharp mind, a romantic, a dreamer, someone who was in love with words, language and food, and someone who had damned good sense. I respected her and admired her. I loved her wit. I adored her book, I FEEL BAD ABOUT MY NECK most of all and it has been almost a lodestone to me as I age. Her humor kept me going when I wanted to cry or scream about the suddenly grey temples I’d sprouted.
There is something called the rapture of the deep, and it refers to what happens when a deep-sea diver spends too much time at the bottom of the ocean and can’t tell which way is up. When he surfaces, he’s liable to have a condition called the bends, where the body can’t adapt to the oxygen levels in the atmosphere. All of this happens to me when I surface from a great book.”
– Nora Ephron, I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman
I didn’t want to post this. I didn’t want to round-up all the links of obits, memories and stories about her life. I didn’t want to, because then, for me it would be real and she would be gone. I didn’t know her but I mourn her loss. Thank God we still have her writings, her words, her humor and wit to sustain us.
From the essay “Twenty-five Things People Have a Shocking Capacity to Be Surprised by Over and Over Again”
1. Journalists sometimes make things up.
2. Journalists sometimes get things wrong.
3. Almost all books that are published as memoirs were initially written as novels, and then the agent/editor said, This might work better as a memoir.
6. Freedom of the press belongs to the man who owns one.”
– Nora Ephron, I Remember Nothing: and Other Reflections
Rest in peace fellow book lover, you were and are much loved.
“Reading is everything. Reading makes me feel like I’ve accomplished something, learned something, become a better person. Reading makes me smarter. Reading gives me something to talk about later on. Reading is the unbelievably healthy way my attention deficit disorder medicates itself. Reading is escape, and the opposite of escape; it’s a way to make contact with reality after a day of making things up, and it’s a way of making contact with someone else’s imagination after a day that’s all too real. Reading is grist. Reading is bliss.”
– Nora Ephron, I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman
Here’s the round-up of tributes, starting with her obituary page where fans can leave a tribute:
Norah Ephron’s obit/tribute page
Los Angeles Times, An Appreciation
New York Times – Norah Epron’s Hollywood Ending
San Francisco Chronicle – When Hilarious Met Sophisticated
USA Today
New York Times – The Best Mailgirl Ever
Washington Post – Norah Ephron’s Thoughts on Having it All
Chicago Tribune – The mail girl made good
ABC News
Philadelphia Inquirer
Boston.com
Entertainment Weekly
Baltimore Sun
Washington Post blog – Norah Ephron and Me
The New Yorker – Norah Ephron, ThirtySomething
E! Online
Seattle Times
MTV
L.A. Times – A video compilation
CBC – A Laugh at Life’s Curveballs
Detroit Free Press
Washington Post – Sally Quinn Shares Memories of her friendship with Norah Ephron
USA Today – Meryl Streep on Norah Ephron
CBS News – Aaron Sorkin on Norah Ephron
New York Daily News
CNN
NPR
Newsday
Norah Ephron columns at the NYT
Yahoo News – Why Norah Ephron Gave Us Heartburn
NYT
Norah Ephron Biography
