Pulitzer Prize winner, Nixon speechwriter William Safire dead
September 28th, 2009 - 3:49 am ICT by Aishwarya Bhatt
New York, Sep 27 (THAINDIAN NEWS) Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist, language expert and former White House speechwriter to President Nixon William Safire succumbed to his battle of cancer on Sunday. He was 79.
He spent his last days as a patient in a hospital in Rockville, Maryland where he was under treatment for his illness.
He was a prolific writer of over 15 books and over 3000 columns in the New York Times magazine. He spoke passionately about civil liberties and Israel.
“Not only was he brilliant in language and assessing the nuances of politics, he was a kind and funny boss who gave lots of credit to others,” his assistant Rosemary Shields said.
In his noted 1999 book “Sound and Fury: The Making of the Punditocracy,” Eric Alterman called Safire an institution unto himself.
“Few insiders doubt that William Safire is the most influential and respected pundit alive,” Alterman wrote.
Mr. Safire also wrote four novels, namely “Full Disclosure,” (Doubleday, 1977), a notorious thriller about succession issues after a president is blinded in an assassination attempt, and nonfiction that included “The New Language of Politics,” and “Before the Fall,” a memoir of his memorable White House years.
His scathing and sarcastic columns on the Carter White House budget director Bert Lance’s financial affairs won him the prestigious Pulitzer Prize for commentary in 1978 and in 1995 Safire was named to the Pulitzer board.
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