Appropriately, it was a car radio that delivered the news to me Steve McQueen was dead. He was 50 years old, the announcer said. Fifty. That had no meaning. It was far too young. It was far too old…I think too of those E.E. Cummings lines: “And what I want to know is– How do you like your blue-eyed boy, Mr. Death?”

Appropriately, it was a car radio that delivered the news to me Steve McQueen was dead. He was 50 years old, the announcer said. Fifty. That had no meaning. It was far too young. It was far too old…I think too of those E.E. Cummings lines: “And what I want to know is– How do you like your blue-eyed boy, Mr. Death?”