There’s a good article about the late comedian Bill Hicks on Salon. Hicks was a terrific comic, as black and profane as anyone not quite at the receiving end of an instant lynch mob could be, but with a core of righteous anger and truth that made sense of his attitude. He was insulting and even cruel because his disgust and rage at the world he lived in was so deep and heartfelt, yet his hope for a better world was intense enough to compel him to change things the way he best knew how: on stage, in front of a microphone, grinding it out night after night.

Anyway, give it a read. The section towards the end about the differences between the U.S. and U.K. editions of a new biography on Hicks is especially amusing.