Adrian Gill has just died, of cancer. He wrote of the Isle of Man that it had "... managed to slip through a crack in the space-time continuum ... fallen off the back of the history lorry to lie amnesiac in the road to progress ... its main industry is money (laundering, pressing, altering and mending) ... everyone you actually see is Benny from Crossroads or Benny in drag…. The weather's foul, the food's medieval, it's covered in suicidal motorists and folk who believe in fairies." He described Manx people as "falling into two types, hopeless, inbred mouth-breathers known as Bennies and retired, small arms dealers and accountants who deal in rainforest futures". No doubt he was joking.
Boris Johnson: "AA Gill was one of the last great stylists of modern journalism and one of the very few who could write a column so full of gags and original similes that it was actually worth reading twice."
There was a moving and candid piece on his illness and treatment in last weekend's Sunday Times magazine. A paean to the NHS is was not, but a brave if bleak account of someone's last days. Humbling reading, I thought.
There was also a piece on PM on Radio 4 last night based upon the last article he wrote for the Sunday Times with interviews from a practicing GP, oncologist and someone from NICE. There has also been an ongoing series of reports from someone else recounting his experiences following a cancer diagnosis with amazing candour and bravery. It would seem that like anything in the NHS it is a lottery as to the quality of treatment you receive and the likely outcome.
