Talent and tragedy: On the death of Amy Winehouse

Amy Winehouse. Very sad, but a gnawing sense of inevitability about this. I hope we respect the memory of her talent, but we don’t enshrine her demise in romantic notions that such talent is necessarily doomed, because this is a dangerous illusion. There’s plenty of great talent out there that persists and survives, but I fear that in her passing she will become an icon for the wrong rather than the right reasons, and the walls of her house will become a mawkish and macabre shrine, like Jim Morrison’s grave in Cimetière Père-Lachaise.

I have to say, it makes me think about the many many more anonymous troubled people and their families who live with their loved ones’ addictions, or other troubles, and are desperate and often powerless to help them. This kind of tragedy happens all over the place, probably on a daily basis, and because they aren’t in the public eye, it goes ignored and untreated, if that's the right word. Plus, without Amy’s fame and the money that accompany it, these unfortunate people often don’t have the access to help and the resources to support their loved ones in the fight against their demons.

Harsh though it may sound, Amy had options as well as a family desperate to help, but over and again, she said “No, No, No.” Others don’t. This is just as tragic. Perhaps even more so.

Fuck the loss of a talent. It’s the loss of a human life that’s so dreadful . . . a daughter, a sister, a friend to some. Talent comes and goes. Others come in its place. Fact. What can’t be replaced is what this young woman, and everyone like her, brings to those who love and care for her, who are now also victims of her addictions and demons, albeit tangentially.

To Amy’s Mum, Janis, her Dad, Mitch, and the rest of her family, I hope the world remembers and respects your grief, and the fact that Amy will always be more to you than a great voice, some good entertainment, and a poster on a fan’s wall. I, and a world full of fans, wish you long life, and the fortitude to heal from, if not forget, this deeply sad end to an incandescent life.