Posted on 09/24/2010 11:46:24 AM PDT by null and void
The man who shot himself on the steps of Memorial Church Saturday morning had published online a 1,905-page document entitled “Suicide Note,” according to his mother.
The death of Mitchell L. Heisman, a 35-year-old Somerville resident, on campus was met with shock, and University officials described the incident as “tragic.”
“It’s really sad, it was horrible, and these kinds of incidents affect all of us really negatively,” Dean of the College Evelynn M. Hammonds said in an interview yesterday. “This campus is situated in an urban context, and we can’t control these kinds of things.”
Born in New York City in 1975, Heisman attended elementary school in Monroe Township, N.J., and graduated with a bachelor’s in psychology from the University of Albany.
While living in a Craigie Street apartment, Heisman wrote “Suicide Note,” a sprawling series of arguments that touch upon historical, religious, and nihilist themes, his mother said.
“He didn’t show me that this was at all what he had in his mind. All I knew was he was finishing his book and he was happy about that,” said his mother Lonni Heisman, 76.
Heisman said she supported publishing her son’s name in The Crimson to let people know of his work “because that’s what he wanted.”
An avid reader interested in mathematics and science, Heisman visited Harvard libraries and may have contacted professors while writing the document, his mother said.
A University spokesman was unable to confirm whether Heisman had reached out to Harvard faculty last night.
The document references Harvard and research done by Harvard faculty—such as Law School professor Alan M. Dershowitz, government professor Harvey C. Mansfield ’53, and psychology professor Steven Pinker—more than half a dozen times.
Heisman discusses death at length in the piece, which is publicly available online.
Heisman committed suicide on the top step of Memorial Church Saturday in front of a tour group of more than 20 people, according to a Cambridge Police Department report.
His death took place during Yom Kippur services that morning and resulted in campus security shutting down the eastern half of Harvard Yard for much of the day.
Jared L. Nathanson, a 37-year-old singer who described himself as Heisman’s acquaintance, said he had had conversations with Heisman about art, music, and movies.
Nathanson received a copy of “Suicide Note” in an e-mail that day.
“From what I understood of him, his book was very important to him,” Nathanson said.
Heisman worked in several bookstores in the area and relied on an inheritance from his father Alvin Heisman—who passed away while Mitchell Heisman was still an adolescent—to support his writing, according to his mother.
But he was reluctant to talk to her about its contents, she said.
“I’m devastated. I just can’t believe it,” she said. “I don’t think I ever will.”
She spoke with Heisman just two days before his death, she said.
“I expected him to come here to help me move, which I am in the process of,” she said. “I expected him to come back in October. He really was non-committal.”
—Staff writer Eric P. Newcomer can be reached at newcomer@fas.harvard.edu. —Staff writer Naveen N. Srivatsa can be reached at srivatsa@fas.harvard.edu.
Read it AFTER trip to New Orleans, caught the references.
Though I read synopsis of it online before the trip and did
get a Lucky Dog at the airport. Twelve inches of paradise.
Do they say how the guy killed himself? I’m assuming he shot himself in the head? On the Harvard campus? What was he doing with a gun? Did he possess it legally or illegally? I can’t imagine Harvard students can legally possess a gun on campus. They have strict gun control laws in Massachusetts, don’t they? If they had only kept a gun out of his hands, this tradgedy would not have happened. I see a big lawsuit coming from this guy’s family against Harvard for allowing this to happen, for allowing this poor soul to have a gun. It’s not this guy’s fault, it’s Harvard’s fault for allowing him to have a gun. Harvard killed this guy, he did not kill himself.
NO KIDDING! Talk about pride.
Probably the only way this guy could ever get published. They say “publish or perish,” looks like he did both.
http://www.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view/20100919suicide_in_harvard_yard/
Shot himself on steps of church
What the hell ever happened to having a couple of cold beers and trying again in the morning.
I hope that you wrote a review of your trip on your Big Chief tablet! *smile*
...or in the morning,afternoon,and evening.
Asphyxiation whilst attempting to recite his suicide note in one breath.
I think he’d be in the running for a Heisman Trophy of a more tragic sort...
Oh, that’s so 20th century :)
Are they sure the 1900 pages wasn’t the financial reform bill
Congress should have hired him to write their bills. They’d be shorter and more coherent.
I looked at the noted, got through the first 10 pages, the guy was really messed up.
That dude rocks...and yet I’m not sure why ;) The commercials are funny.
My first thought was that is what he did for a living.
See. I told you it was murder trying to get a book published out there. :-)
In my opinion, anyone who commits suicide negates everything he has ever done. I might make an exception for cases like Van Gogh, who was most likely poisoned by the heavy metals in his pigments.
I will not voluntarily read a single word of this book.
lol
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