Death
Sir Robert Helpmann died in Sydney in 1986. His obituaries in the Australian media were suitably laudatory, but also reserved. The country paid him the highest final recognition it could by honouring him with a state funeral in Sydney, the eulogy calling him "a genius, an outstanding communicator of unique inspiration and insight. He asserted his rights to pursue a path that improved the quality of life of the nation, and defeated the common herd of detractors".
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Famous quotes containing the word death:
“Life contracts and death is expected,
As in a season of autumn.
The soldier falls.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)
“Now they heap the funeral pyre,
And the torch of death they light;
Ah! ‘tis hard to die by fire!”
—William Makepeace Thackeray (1811–1863)
“Consider his life which was valueless
In terms of employment, hotel ledgers, news files.
Consider. One bullet in ten thousand kills a man.
Ask. Was so much expenditure justified
On the death of one so young and so silly
Lying under the olive tree, O world, O death?”
—Stephen Spender (1909–1995)