George Carlin (1937 - 2008)

The Famous Comedian Dead of Heart Failure at the Age of 71

It is now a sad sad day for the world of comedy. George Carlin, one of the greatest comedians that had ever lived, has died of heart failure in Los Angeles. He was 71 years old. I only just found out about this a couple of minutes ago, and I am very saddened at the news of this. It feels like we have robbed of one of the defining comedic voices of many generations. Carlin had gone from being a child reared in the Catholic school system, to a counter-culture hero, constantly rallying against the hypocrisy of politics and religion which are never ending.

George was born Irish Catholic and was educated mostly in Catholic schools in New York. Years later, he would come to be known as one of the most famous lapsed Catholics in show business. He would later say in one of his HBO shows (he has done 11 of them since 1977) that he was a Catholic before he reached "the age of reason." When he was in the army, he worked as a disc jockey which he did very well. After that, he did a comedy act with Jack Burns from 1960 to 1962. When he and Jack split, Jack went to work at Second City in Chicago, and George moved on to become a solo stand-up comedian. While working as a solo comedian, he went from being a conventional comedian to radically changing his act. He began to go against the ingrained conservative nature of America and how it mired itself in the hypocrisies of religion and politics. George also loved playing around with the English language and the different meanings found in it. This would later lead to perhaps his most famous piece as a comedian, "The Seven Words You Can't Say On Television." At one performance, he was arrested for doing this bit.

I actually had the lucky opportunity of meeting George when he did a performance at Knockti Harbor in Northern California. My dad's secretary at the time was the girlfriend of Carlin's manager, and she was more than happy to get me to meet him before he did his show. I shook his hand, and he could not have been nicer. I congratulated him on getting the Grammy for "Jammin' In New York" as I usually don't give a shit at about the Grammy's in general. George replied to me,