Michael again here.
Brian Micklethwait, the owner of this blog, died this morning of lung cancer. We are all greatly saddened by this terrible news. He will be missed.
Michael again here.
Brian Micklethwait, the owner of this blog, died this morning of lung cancer. We are all greatly saddened by this terrible news. He will be missed.
Terrible news Michael. So sad to hear about this.
My deepest condolences to Brian’s family and many friends, including those here.
He will indeed be missed.
Condolences to all.
He will be missed so much. Brian was a beacon of sensible thought on a range of subjects and a good friend.
I’m very sorry to hear this. I never met Brian in “real life”, but I often drew on his writings for my “quote of the day” posts on my blog. My condolences to his family and friends.
He will be missed, RIP Brian, you were one of a kind.
I dreaded to come over to this blog, felt it is now a matter of days…
My sincerest condolences to friends and family.
I’m so sorry to hear the news. However I consoled myself by realising how incredibly lucky I was in knowing and being a friend of Brian. As well as being incredibly bright he was in my opinion a thoroughly decent person, ready to help anyone who wanted to understand the way the world works! He like a true artist looked at things slightly askance and so had many great insights about all sorts of subjects and I always felt I’d like to be on his side in a debate whatever it was about! My condolences to all his close friends and family.RIP.
Sad, sad news.
You will certainly be missed, Brian.
Many thanks for keeping us informed on matters, Michael – it is much appreciated.
Sad news to hear to be sure. Thank you for the update Michael.
There is an excellent obituary of Brian, written by his friend here:
https://thecritic.co.uk/remembering-brian-micklethwait/
I knew Brian from about 1980 to about 1995, and then saw him again at Chris Tame’s funeral in 2006. I was deeply shocked to hear of his illness and death. Brian was a fixture in my consciousness, someone who existed in the background even when we weren’t in touch. He had been part of my youth. Always helpful, Brian provided desktop publishing for my businesses when it was a brand new technology. He was a typical English eccentric. I’ll always remember the hundreds (?) of neatly stack empty Nescafe jars in his flat. His personality delighted my elderly mother when she met him in the early 80s. My world has been impoverished by his death, even though we hadn’t been in touch for years. RIP Brian.
Ah yes. The Nescafe jars…
🙁
Only just found out about this. I came across Brian in the early 2000s soon after first coming across the word “libertarian”. A google search had led me to find an announcement about some regular meetings at Brian’s flat in Pimlico and one day I turned up for one. After the somewhat formal meeting where someone gave a talk Brian engaged me as a new attendee. I explained how I’d come to discover a little about libertarianism and he asked me if I wrote. I said that I’d thought about writing a piece about ASH and their propaganda war against tobacco. He strongly encouraged me to write the piece and told me where it could be published.
I went to several other such meetings at Brian’s place and found them highly stimulating and met some very interesting people.
Very sorry to learn he has now gone.