“I am an American, Chicago born – Chicago, that somber city – and go at things as I have taught myself, free-style, and will make the record in my own way: first to knock, first admitted; sometimes an innocent knock, sometimes a not so innocent.”

So begins THE great American novel, The Adventures of Augie March, by Montreal-born Saul Bellow who died yesterday at 89.

I am sad.

Read the NYTimes appreciation, and thanks to them for the photo.

photo credit; Neal Boenzi/The New York Times